Sam Vaknin

In 2019, Vaknin appeared in the online documentary "Plugged-in: The True Toxicity of Social Media Revealed" produced by Richard Grannon.

Vaknin is visiting professor at Southern Federal University in Rostov Oblast, Russia in 2017-9 holding a course of lectures there on personality theory in psychology. He is also a professor of finance and a professor of psychology in the Centre for International Advanced and Professional Studies (CIAPS) in Nigeria.

In 2016, Vaknin appeared in the documentary "How Narcissists Took Over the World" produced by Vice Media.

In 2009, he was the subject of an Australian documentary film, I, Psychopath, directed by Ian Walker. In the film, Vaknin underwent a psychological evaluation in which he met the criteria for psychopathy according to the Hare Psychopathy Checklist, but did not meet the criteria for narcissism.

In 2007, Vaknin appeared in the episode "Egomania" of the British Channel 4 documentary series Mania.

Vaknin moved to Skopje, Macedonia, where he married Macedonian Lidija Rangelovska. They set up Narcissus Publications in 1997, which publishes Vaknin's work. Between 2001 and 2003, Vaknin was a Senior Business Correspondent for United Press International. He has also written for Central Europe Review about political issues in the Balkans, as well as for the Middle East Times. Until a few weeks before the September 2002 Macedonian election, he served as an adviser to Macedonia's Ministry of Finance. He writes regularly for other publications, such as the International Analyst Network, and the online American Chronicle.

In Israel in 1995 he was found guilty on three counts of securities fraud along with two other men, Nissim Avioz and Dov Landau. He was sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment and fined 50,000 shekels (about $14,000), while the company was fined 100,000 shekels. In 1996, as a condition of parole, he agreed to a mental health evaluation, which noted various personality disorders. According to Vaknin, "I was borderline schizoid, but the most dominant was NPD," and on this occasion he accepted the diagnosis, because, he wrote, "it was a relief to know what I had."

A model of quantised time was proposed by Vaknin in his 1982 Ph.D. dissertation, titled "Time Asymmetry Revisited". The dissertation was published by California Miramar University. The dissertation submitted postulates the existence of a particle (chronon). In the proposed theory, time is the result of the interaction of chronons, very much as other forces in nature are the result of other particle interactions. Vaknin postulates the existence of various time quarks (up, down, colors, etc.) whose properties cancel each other and thus the arrow of time is derived (time asymmetry). The postulated particle (chronon) is not only an ideal clock, but also mediates time itself (analogous to the relationship between the Higgs boson and mass). In other words, what we call "time" is the interaction between chronons in a field. Chronons exchange between them a particle and thereby exert a force. "Events" are perturbations in the Time Field and they are distinct from chronon interactions. Chronon interactions (particle exchanges) in the Time Field generate "time" and "time asymmetry" as we observe them.

He left home to serve in the Israel Defense Forces from 1979 to 1982 in training and education units. Between 1980 and 1983 he founded a chain of computerized information kiosks in Tel Aviv, and in 1982 worked for the Nessim D. Gaon Group in Geneva, Paris, and New York City. It was in the mid-1980s that he became aware of difficulties in his relationship with his fiancée, and that he had mood swings. In 1985 he sought help from a psychiatrist, who diagnosed him with narcissistic personality disorder (NPD). Vaknin did not accept the diagnosis at the time. From 1986 to 1987 he was the general manager of IPE Ltd. in London. He moved back to Israel, where he became director of an Israeli investment firm, Mikbatz Teshua. He was also president of the Israeli chapter of the Unification Church's Professors for World Peace Academy.

Shmuel "Sam" Vaknin (born April 21, 1961) is an Israeli writer. He is the author of Malignant Self Love: Narcissism Revisited (1999), was editor-in-chief of political news website Global Politician, and runs a private website about narcissistic personality disorder (NPD). He has also postulated a theory on chronons and time asymmetry.