Mediating Role of Self-Esteem and Self-Efficacy in Paths Between Covert Narcissism and Mental Wellbeing in Pakistani Doctors

Previous researches substantiate the lack of evidence pertaining to personality features influencing mental wellbeing of doctors working in stressful hospital environment. The present study highlights covert narcissism as important factor of doctors' mental wellbeing, with mediating role of self-esteem and self-efficacy. This research employed cross-sectional research design and used Purposive sampling technique to select the research participants from Rawalpindi and Islamabad, Pakistan. Sample consisted of N = 176 doctors aged between 24 to 34 years (M = 27.37, SD = 2.04). The Maladaptive Covert Narcissism Scale (MCNS), Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (WEMWBS), Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES) and General Self-efficacy Scale (GSE) were used to assess covert narcissism, mental wellbeing, self-esteem and self-efficacy respectively. Bivariate correlation revealed that covert narcissism had significant negative

relationship with self-esteem, self-efficacy, and mental wellbeing, whereas self-esteem and self-efficacy had a significant positive relationship with mental wellbeing. Multiple regression analysis

found covert narcissism as significant negative predictor of mental wellbeing, whereas self-esteem and self-efficacy were established to be significant positive predictors of mental wellbeing. Furthermore, mediation through Process Macro made it evident that self-efficacy and self-esteem significantly mediate the association between covert narcissism and mental wellbeing. This study provides the insight that interventions designed for enhancing mental wellbeing of doctors must focus on covert narcissism, self-esteem and self-efficacy in order to get therapeutic success.