A guide to how narcissists and psychopaths use cognitive dissonance and find out how to overcome it.
What is cognitive dissonance?
Social psychologist Leon Festinger proposed a theory called cognitive dissonance to explain how conflicting thoughts, beliefs, and behaviors could cause an uncomfortable discrepancy. Cognitive dissonance can occur when people learn latest information that contradicts their beliefs (belief-denial) once they act against their beliefs, possibly due to an anticipated reward or punishment (forced compliance) or once they engage in undesirable activities to attain a desired goal (justification of effort). These uncomfortable discrepancies can force people to attempt to resolve the cognitive dissonance by changing their thoughts, beliefs, or behaviors to revive a way of cohesion and stability.
Neurological research indicates that cognitive dissonance prompts certain areas of the brain that influence our decision making, processing our emotions, and avoiding aversive outcomes, similar to the medial prefrontal cortex, insula, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. To resolve cognitive dissonance, people can do certainly one of the next: 1) change one’s behavior to resolve the conflict 2) change certainly one of the conflicting thoughts in an try and justify the continuation of the behavior 3) add other “coherent” or consistent thoughts to construct an argument for one thought over one other, or 4) minimize the importance of the inconsistency (or thought dissonant) or increasing the importance of consonant thoughts.
Cognitive dissonance and relationships with narcissists and psychopaths
Tests indicates that individuals in romantic relationships with narcissistic and psychopathic people can experience it symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder related to the connection. While the harm of those relationships is apparent, cognitive dissonance continues to be common in all these relationships attributable to manipulation and gas lighting to which survivors are sometimes subjected. In the sphere of intimate partner violence studies show that victims of abuse who’re related to their abusers (persecutors who are inclined to antisocial or narcissistic traits) can resolve cognitive dissonance by minimizing or justifying the abuser’s behavior as a way to cope with the trauma of the abuse, self-blame, or reinterpret the aggression in a way that permits positive feelings toward the abuser to proceed (e.g., they’re joking. That’s not what they meant.”) They may blame an external source, similar to substances, for the abuse.
These excuses and indulgences are subconscious attempts to resolve cognitive dissonance and make the victim more tolerant of abuse in additional committed relationships over time attributable to the upper level of investment. It can be clear that narcissistic abusers use gaslighting tactics to shift blame and avoid responsibility for his or her abuses, which can instill or exacerbate guilt.
How to scale back/combat cognitive dissonance
Here are some effective ways you’ll be able to cognitively reframe your experiences with a narcissistic or psychopathic abuser to resolve cognitive dissonance in a way that protects and advantages you:
1. Reconcile the differences between the narcissist’s true self and their false self, recognizing that this is an element of their manipulation. Identifying the narcissist’s true self and their false self is the important thing to resolving cognitive dissonance. Narcissists and psychopaths engage in emotional changes and chameleon-like behaviors to deceive their targets. This is because they’re emotionally shallow and don’t experience the strong emotions or empathy they claim to feel towards others. They can take many forms to make you query yourself and the mistreatment you experience. That’s why you often experience Jekyll and Hyde behaviors that confuse you and make you walk on eggshells – because they switch different identities to get their needs from other people.
This can create dissonant thoughts and beliefs about who the narcissist really is and cause you to interact in certain behaviors or rationalizations to “justify” staying in the connection. For example, victims of abuse may come to imagine that they “cause” the narcissist’s behavior, when in actual fact the narcissist follows these manipulative patterns with most of their partners. Or, they might ignite to imagine that the narcissist is the loving, empathic partner they initially portrayed themselves to be, who “occasionally” gets frustrated and lashes out, minimizing the frequency of actual abuse. The narcissist will actively increase this cognitive dissonance blaming you for his or her abuse they usually claim you’re the one one who has ever had this problem with them.
To resolve this dissonance, it’s good to realize that the positive qualities the narcissist presented to start with are unlikely to be the identity your narcissistic partner embodies in the long term. See it because the initial mask they wore to lure you right into a relationship – a mask constructed to appeal to your unique needs, wants, and desires. When they take off that mask and begin devaluing you, you’ll witness their true colours and lack of empathy and character. It could also be helpful to make a listing of the traits you have got witnessed of their false selves with a heading like “The Narcissus pretended to be this.” Then, next to that list, write down the characteristics you’re experiencing without delay under the heading “Here’s Who They Really Are.”
2. Identify the parable of sunk costs and the fear of “missing” the narcissist’s potential and realize that you just don’t miss the narcissist, but who he pretended to be. In the world of economics, the sunk cost fallacy is that an individual continues to take a position in some behavior, enterprise, or enterprise due to the time, energy, and resources she or he has already put into it, whatever the losses or risks incurred and can proceed to incur. Think about all that this toxic relationship has already cost you in comparison with the modest advantages. The narcissist can have used tactics similar to future pretense and love bombing to make you think of their potential. Now is the time to get in contact with the fact of the dark future that awaits if you happen to proceed to interact with them. Read the stories of other individuals who have experienced one of these abuse in long-term marriages to higher understand how a narcissistic or psychopathic person can change the trajectory of your life and cause severe trauma. Ask yourself what risks and losses will I even have to deal within the continuation of this relationship?
Identifying the narcissist’s true self and the damage they’ve done – and the damage they’ll inevitably do in the long run – will permit you to look more critically at your personal sunk cost fallacy and realize that there is no such thing as a “payoff” or positive return on the investment you set into the connection. In fact, you might lose greater than you ever gain if you happen to decide to stay in such a relationship. Remember: you are not in a relationship with the fake character they portrayed to start with – so you’ll be able to’t predict the long run with their potential. You need to anticipate the traumatic future that awaits their true selves. You don’t miss a narcissist. You miss who they pretended to be.
3. Learn probably the most common manipulation tactics and discover those which have been used against you. When you’re unaware of the assorted manipulation tactics narcissists and psychopaths engage in, it is simple to fall into the trap of blaming yourself or minimizing and rationalizing the narcissist’s actions as incidental or simply a part of the spectrum of “normal” human imperfections. Distinguish between normal human flaws and pathological behaviors by evaluating the tactics often utilized by narcissists and psychopaths to reap the benefits of others. Identify tactics, e.g gas lighting, love bombing, vacuuming, dog whistlingprojection, countering, inducing jealousy and other diversionary tactics that narcissists use to maintain you off balance and depend on their validation. Write down or recall how each tactic was used against you to make you’re feeling unworthy that “provokes” the narcissist. In fact, the narcissist or psychopath has been repeatedly frightening you they usually exit of their approach to make you suffer.
4. Reality tests the narcissist’s merciful subterfuges and rationalizations – and their very own justifications for his or her behavior. Survivors of abuse can fall right into a trap rationalizing narcissist behavior as resulting from uncontrollable anger or minimize abuse. Ask yourself how their behaviors may be accidental in the event that they rarely occur in front of other witnesses. For example, why doesn’t a narcissist or psychopath get mad at their boss the best way they get mad at you behind closed doors if their behavior is so uncontrollable and out of frustration? Is it because they know they might be held accountable and suffer the results, which implies they’re in full control of their behavior, know right from unsuitable, and are aware of what behavior can and can’t get away with? If you assume that the narcissist’s childhood trauma is the source of their behavior, ask yourself why a lot tests indicates that parental overvaluation, relatively than childhood abuse, causes narcissistic traits.
Even in the event that they were traumatized, why did you or others you realize also experience childhood trauma but don’t hurt innocent people? If the narcissist often exhibits pathetic tricks persuade you that they’re the victims, ask yourself why You is he all the time hurt? Who is the true victim here – the one who suffers? Why only a narcissist or psychopath can use something negative that happened to them up to now to justify hurting you when there are complex injury survivors on the planet who’ve never used their history to justify hurting innocent people and will even use their past as an incentive to treat others kinder? You are an empathic one who shows empathy even to the narcissist who hurts you – nonetheless, the narcissist is frequently devoid of empathy and callous towards others. Given this information, who do you think that is actually the source of relationship problems? Questions like these will help ground you in the fact of the narcissist’s willful abuse—and within the narcissist’s true nature.
big photo: Dealing with cognitive dissonance in a relationship with a narcissist or psychopath may be overwhelming. During your healing journey, it could actually be helpful to seek the advice of with a health skilled. Use these exercises to discover your cognitive dissonance, conflicting thoughts and beliefs about toxic relationships, and clear the mental fog so you’ll be able to safely end the connection.
