Little is known about how individuals high in grandiose narcissism think about what could have been. Across four studies (three online surveys and one online experiment; N = 801), we addressed this gap by examining the relationship between grandiose narcissism, its admiration and rivalry dimensions, and counterfactual thinking and regret. Unlike anticipated, high rivalry was associated with more rather than fewer upward counterfactuals in Study 1. Yet, high rivalry predicted an increased likelihood of generating a downward (vs. upward) counterfactual in a feedback situation (Study 3). Moreover, grandiose narcissism (preliminary study) and admiration (Study 2) negatively correlated with regret. Collectively, our findings stress the importance of considering grandiose narcissism’s dimensions separately and highlight a novel dispositional moderator of counterfactual thinking.

对于那些高度自恋的人如何思考可能发生的事情，我们知之甚少。跨越四项研究（三项在线调查和一项在线实验；N = 801），我们通过研究夸大自恋、其钦佩和竞争维度以及反事实思维和遗憾之间的关系来解决这一差距。与预期不同，在研究 1 中，高竞争与更多而不是更少的向上反事实相关。然而，高竞争预测在反馈情况下产生向下（相对于向上）反事实的可能性增加（研究 3）。此外，夸大的自恋（初步研究）和钦佩（研究2）与后悔呈负相关。总的来说，我们的研究结果强调了单独考虑夸大自恋维度的重要性，并强调了一种新的反事实思维的性格调节剂。