Egomania is a psychiatric term used to describe excessive preoccupation with one's ego, identity or self[1] and applies the same preoccupation to anyone who follows one’s own ungoverned impulses, is possessed by delusions of personal greatness & grandeur and feels a lack of appreciation.[2] Someone suffering from this extreme egocentric focus is an egomaniac. Egomania as a condition, while not a classified personality disorder, is considered psychologically abnormal.[1]
The term "egomania" is often used by laypersons in a pejorative fashion to describe an individual who is perceived as intolerably self-centered. Narcissistic personality disorder is the clinical condition that most resembles and is most often associated with this definition and usage of the term, though the two differ vastly according to the individual's responses to others.[3]
- ^ a b dictionary.com
- ^ H.C.R. Norriss Indulgent parents; Alienist Says they Make their Children Egomaniacs, July 24, 1913, The New York Times
- ^ Gretchen Reevy et al eds., Encyclopedia of Emotions: Volume I (2010) p. 217