When Institutions Behave Like Narcissistic Lovers

The very real psychological consequences of systems without humane correction.

Posted May 28, 2026 | Reviewed by Michelle Quirk

Many people leave workplaces—including politics , universities, and healthcare systems—feeling profoundly disoriented. Not merely exhausted, but psychologically diminished.

They often describe feeling unseen, replaceable, manipulated, blamed, or emotionally erased. They feel traumatized, with all the consequences that come with that. One recent study asked early career academics about their work experiences, and it highlights this rhetoric and responsibility on a microlevel (Martínez-Goñi et al., 2026).

Often, the language sounds less like organizational dissatisfaction and more like the aftermath of a toxic relationship of sorts.

And indeed, there are parallels. Institutions regularly appear to operate with the emotional profile of narcissistic lovers: demanding devotion while lacking reciprocal empathy.

Not that institutions are clinically narcissistic, but they are often large systems that optimize for self-preservation, image management, and risk avoidance, full of unchallenged hierarchy and continuity of power.

Without humane correction mechanisms and enhancements, like good leadership , diversity, and staff policies, institutions can begin to resemble relational dynamics associated with narcissism.

To avert psychological harm and ensure thriving people as well as institutions, we need human "interference." Institutions need leaders, policies, and cultures where compassion, reasonable flexibility, relational accountability, context sensitivity, repair and discussion, and diversity act as restorative buffers.

Without these in place, top-down and ingrained in institutional culture, institutions risk becoming psychologically extractive in a toxic manner.

The Parallels With Narcissistic Relationships

There are several parallel processes in toxically extractive workplaces that are akin to narcissistic dynamics.

1. Idealization followed by devaluation

Institutions often recruit staff with grand language:

Companies often treat new staff as promising, talented, and "better than." Think, for example, of the large jumps in salary that can be gained by jumping companies. But they often devalue people once they become inconvenient, ill, disabled, pregnant , dissenting, or exhausted. And this is often further compounded for minority groups—the immigrant-background politician with mental health struggles, the pregnant Ph.D. student, the disillusioned female surgeon.

People are valued primarily for productivity , compliance, prestige, output, and optics. And while understandable from a productivity perspective, this, in the absence of supportive policies, relates closely to burnout culture. As we practice in therapy , worth and productivity can be separated, and this does not have to harm the bottom line or become a hippy approach.

3. Gaslighting through bureaucracy

People are told, “We care about well-being,” while at the same time systems structurally produce harm—words and behaviours that don’t add up.

The contradiction creates cognitive dissonance . And it is especially pronounced in politics, healthcare settings, universities, and around diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) rhetoric.

4. Punishment for authenticity

Whistleblowers and neurodivergent people often destabilize institutional image management. Thus, institutional systems, when left unchecked, reward masking , silence, performative positivity, strategic conformity , and lack of diversity.

5. Lack of genuine repair or conversation

Importantly, human relationships survive ruptures and grow through:

But often, institutions offer procedural responses instead of relational repair at best and silence or punishment at worst.

Healthy Institutions Need a Humane Touch

Healthy institutions are not merely efficient and productive. They are capable of repair, humility, dialogue, and recognition of complexity. Without these humane enhancements, institutions risk becoming psychologically corrosive and toxic, asking people for devotion while remaining fundamentally incapable of mutual empathy and often doing active harm.

With great power comes great responsibility: how scientific supervisors shape the wellbeing of early-career researchers. Xabier Simón Martínez-Goñi, Agustín J. Marín-Peña, Mario Corrochano-Monsalve, Adrián Bozal-Leorri. bioRxiv 2026.05.05.722947; doi: https://doi.org/10.64898/2026.05.05.722947

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Joyce Vromen, Ph.D. , is a registered psychologist and founder of Joyce Vromen Psychology, a private practice specialising in neurodiversity assessments.

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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.