The concept of narcissism dates back from Narkissos in Greek myhology, who fell in love with the self after seeing hie own reflection in water (Turkish Linguistic Association). Narcissismis divided into two: normal level and pathological level (Campbell, 2001; Campbell, Rudich& Sedikides, 2002). Normal narcissism is an individual’s harmony with himself/herself, with his /her circle of friends, and with individuals around him/her, and his/her feeling that he/she can meet the expectations of others around him/her (Rozenblatt, 2002). Pathological narcissism, on the other hand, is the case where an individual is open to and in need of being fed by external explanations and comments. Thus, individuals who are pathologically narcissist develop strong mechanisms for defence in order to protect themselves against threats to them. Therefore, individuals suffering from pathological narcissism act extremely sensitively and respond in this way to negative feelings and criticisms against them (Kernberg, 1975). For these reasons, normal norcisism and pathological narcissism are different (Kernberg, 1985). Pathological narcissism is defined by personality disorder. Personality disorder is considered as a deviation from “normal personality” (Kohut, 1977; Rose, 2002; Sayar, 2003). Frequency and prevalence in personality disorder change depending on situations, societies, cultures and people (Özçetin et al., 2008).

Narcissism has become a remarkable phenomenon as the source of individuals’ behaviours, attitudes and perceptions in recent years (Ames, Rose & Anderson, 2006). It is observed that narcissism, which is mostly studied in the literature by psychiatry and clinical psychology, has been included in the topics of administration recently – despite rarely. It is expected that the personality traits of individuals who are leaders in organisational life influence employees’ motivation in an organisation, their job satisfaction, their organisational commitment, their perception of security, and the atmosphere in the organisation. On the other hand, due to the fact that individuals with narcissistic personality traits have high motivation, that they take on and fulfill leadership roles successfully and that they have high performance; there are significant correlations between organisational behaviour and narcissistic personality structure (Hyman, 1989; Popper, 2002; Wallace &Baumeister, 2002). Yet, if individuals having narcissistic personality cannot be promoted to the positions they deserve in their organisation, they can experience dissatisfaction. There are direct relations between narcissism and violence within organisations (Penney, 2002; Temel, 2008). Therefore, administrators’ personality traits have great importance in the effectiveness of organisations.

This study aims to determine the levels of primary and secondary school administrators’ personality traits and whether or not school directors’ narcissistic personality traits differ significantly on the basis of gender. 

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