Psychology Commons^™

Psychopathy In Society: Understanding The Neural Mechanisms That Give Rise To Psychopathic Traits, Phoebe Zalenski

Psychological Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

Psychopathy is characterized as an individual exhibiting callousness, grandiosity, lack of empathy, and manipulative behavior towards others over a long period of time. Given these symptoms, psychopathy is associated with a markedly increased risk of arrest and imprisonment. Together, these findings highlight the importance of understanding the cause(s) of psychopathy, as doing so may help to develop treatments or preventative interventions. Prior work has suggested that structural abnormalities in the amygdala may play a role in clinical psychopathy; however, it is less clear whether amygdala abnormalities exist on a continuum of psychopathic traits. In this study, I aimed to determine …

The Big Five And Dark Triad: The Role Of Personality In The Development Of Passion, Hannah Behar

Honors Theses

The present work explored the connection between personality and the Dualistic Model of Passion (DMP) and weather psychological safety moderated this relationship. The first study comprised 109 Introduction to Psychology students at the University of Richmond, and the second study measured 128 MTurk participants. The web-based survey administered to both samples consisted of measures assessing Harmonious Passion (HP), Obsessive Passion (OP), the Big Five traits, the Dark Triad traits, and Psychological Safety (PS). Due to reliability concerns, only OP and the Dark Triad traits could be used to assess the MTurk sample. Results from regression analysis showed that among MTurk …

Religiosity As A Moderator Of Infidelity In Dark Triad Women, Sophie M. Domanik

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Projects

Personality is a major determinant of behavior. The Dark Triad is a cluster of personality traits-- psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism-- commonly associated with callousness, manipulation, and anti-social behavior. In the realm of relationships, Dark Triad traits have been shown to predict a host of destabilizing behaviors, including infidelity. Infidelity has negative psychological impacts on those involved, with research citing infidelity as a precursor to major depressive episodes for some individuals. High levels of religiosity, on the other hand, predict negative attitudes toward infidelity and fewer instances of cheating overall. The present study investigated whether levels of religiosity moderate infidelity intentions …

Does Insufficient Effort Responding Account For The Relationship Between Psychopathy And Social Desirability?, Logan F. Folger

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research investigated the relationship between self-report psychopathy and social desirability and whether insufficient effort responding may impact this relationship. It was hypothesized that insufficient effort responding is biasing the relationship. Therefore, the significant negative relationship between psychopathy and social desirability may approach zero after isolating insufficient effort responding data. Two studies were conducted to aid this investigation. The first study utilized the Monte Carlo method to simulate this relationship. The simulation had 1,000 trials using 1,000 participants with proportions of valid respondents ranging from 0.0 to 1.0 with increments of 0.1. The results showed that insufficient effort responding may …

Control, Alter, And Delete: Investigating The Manipulation Of Memory And Memorial Beliefs By Suspected Psychopaths In Interpersonal Relationships, Kendra Nespoli

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Psychopaths are known to wreak havoc in the lives, careers, and relationships of people with whom they come into contact, triggering impacts that can extend for many years. To date, few studies have investigated the psychological tactics used by psychopaths to manipulate and control others in relationships. Previous research in the area of autobiographical memory has demonstrated that the decisions people make regarding belief in their memory for life events are influenced by feedback received from others. Social feedback has been shown to be a powerful influence in persuading others to revise beliefs about past events, particularly in the context …

Examining The Effects Of State Anger On Self-Reported Psychopathic Trait Inventories, Olivia C. Preston

Dissertations

Research indicates that experiencing anger is linked to social undesirability and temporarily induces a host of significant changes within an individual, such as hostile attribution bias, lower trust, increased impulsivity, poorer decision-making, and preferential recall. Such changes theoretically may inflate psychopathy scores due to a greater ability or willingness to endorse attitudes, behaviors, cognitions, and emotions that are regarded as reflective of psychopathic traits and may potentially introduce random error variance into measurement. Such distortion due to mood may bear important implications for applied settings where one individual’s scores are measured at a single time point, rather than research where …

Articulating The Heart Of Darkness: A Psychometric And Behavioral Analysis Of The Relationship Between Psychopathy And Sadism, Emily Lasko

Theses and Dissertations

Psychopathy and sadism, personality constructs largely characterized by antagonistic tendencies, share several similar traits and behaviors such as cruelty, callousness, and antisocial behavior. Due to this overlap, it remains unclear whether sadism is simply a facet of psychopathy, or they represent distinct but related constructs. The degree of overlap and distinction between these traits has yet to be empirically and thoroughly examined; therefore, the present project had two overarching interconnected aims: 1) Investigate the degree of psychometric overlap between psychopathy and sadism, and 2) examine potential behavioral distinctions between psychopathy and sadism. In Study 1, participants completed an online battery …

The Roles Of Violence Exposure And Gender On The Relationship Between Adolescent Psychopathic And Conduct Disorder Traits And The Capability For Suicide, Tiffany Harrop

Dissertations

Suicide represents one of the leading causes of mortality for adolescents. Externalizing behaviors, such as psychopathic and conduct disorder traits, represent risk factors for adolescent suicide. Investigation of suicide capability is especially important, as it is theorized to distinguish individuals who evince suicide ideation from those who progress to making a suicide attempt. Currently, associations between psychopathic and conduct disorder traits and capability in youth are understudied, as well as factors that may potentiate these associations, such as exposure to violence and gender. The aim of this study was to explore the interactive nature of psychopathic and conduct disorder traits, …

Neural Correlates Of Automatic Emotional Processing And Emotion Regulation In Empathy And Psychopathy-Related Coldheartedness, Danielle Difilipo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Psychopathy is a personality disorder that is defined, in part, by a lack of empathy. Psychopathy-related empathic deficits have been associated with atypical behavioral and neural responses to emotional facial expressions. Although the mirror neuron system (MNS) has been implicated in empathy, very few studies have examined the role of MNS functioning as it pertains to empathy impairments in psychopathy. Moreover, there is very little empirical research regarding emotion regulation in psychopathy, and specifically whether emotional responses can be intentionally upregulated. The present study sought to clarify whether the MNS is functionally intact in adults with subclinical psychopathic traits, particularly …

Validating Empathy As Captured By The Meanness In Psychopathy-Self Report, Stephanie Marie Molina

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Psychopathy is a distinctive personality disorder with an array of interpersonal and affective deficits. In particular, deficits in affective and cognitive empathy skills are noted to be a central feature of psychopathy. Specifically, the construct of psychopathic meanness, which is conceptualized as a tendency to act aggressively without regard for others, is preferentially related to deficient empathy. To elucidate the relationship between psychopathic meanness and empathy, three studies were conducted utilizing the Meanness in Psychopathy-Self Report (MiP- SR). The MiP-SR is a new measure that parses apart the construct of psychopathic meanness into three factors: Malice, Coldness, and Imperviousness. MiP-SR …

Dark Triad Personality Traits Prediction Of Managers' Mind-Set In Business Organizations, Robert Kabat

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Presence of the Dark Triad traits of Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy in the workplace, especially among managers, has received increased attention due to the implications for organizations. One way to influence behavior in business organizations is through controlled interventions to change individual mind-sets. A review of the extant literature indicated that the relationship between Dark Triad traits and mind-set had not been sufficiently examined. A quantitative study was conducted to examine whether a manager's Dark Triad traits predict their mindset. To explore this relationship, a sample of 153 managers' responses was collected online. The Short Dark Triad measure was used …

Differences In Psychopathy And Associated Traits By Police Officer Rank, Rosanne Libretti

Student Theses

Most psychopathy research focuses on its manifestation in forensic populations, however these results may not generalize onto noncriminal, or “successful,” psychopaths. Lykken (1995) conjectured that socialization may enable “heroes,” like law enforcement, to utilize the interpersonal and affective aspects of psychopathy in a manner that benefits society. Previous research (Falkenbach et al., 2018a) suggests that psychopathy and its correlates differ between police recruits and individuals in the community. It is necessary to continue this work with other groups in the police force to see if the patterns found in these studies generalize to veteran officers who have worked in law …

Psychopathic Personality Traits As A Moderator Of The Relationship Between Social Intelligence And Relational Aggression, Savannah Merold

Master's Theses

Social intelligence has been identified as one of many predictors of relational aggression. It is likely that a certain level of social intelligence may be necessary for relationally aggressive behaviors to be effective (e.g., some ability to understand human behavior is necessary to effectively harm others through the manipulation of status, social relationships, or sense of belonging). And yet, social intelligence is unlikely to be sufficient to produce relationally aggressive behavior. Merely because someone has the requisite levels of social intelligence to use relational aggression does not mean that he or she will be motivated to do so. There is …

Psychopathic Traits, Substance Use, And Motivation To Change: The Effectiveness Of Motivational Interviewing With At-Risk Adolescents, Christopher Thomas Alan Gillen

Dissertations

The current study is the first known study to investigate the effectiveness of Motivational Interviewing (MI) as a motivational enhancement intervention in at-risk adolescents with psychopathic traits and substance use (SU) problems. Further, it examined whether such an intervention can improve problematic behavior (i.e., aggression, delinquency) and treatment responsivity deficits (i.e., motivation to change) associated with psychopathy and SU. The effectiveness of MI was examined using a randomized treatment-control design in which adolescents were assigned to either a three-session group-based MI intervention and a residential treatment or a group receiving only the residential treatment without the MI component. Participants were …

Not All Bad: Exploring The Link Between Psychopathy And Success, Lily Constance Harker

Senior Projects Spring 2018

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Who Posts Selfies And Why?: Personality, Attachment Style, And Mentalization As Predictors Of Selfie Posting On Social Media, Nancy Adler

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examines the phenomenon of selfie posting on social media and its relationship to narcissism, the Dark Triad, impulsivity, attachment style, rejection sensitivity, and reflective functioning. The sample was made up of 499 participants who completed an online survey consisting of personality measures and open- and closed-ended questions about selfie posting behavior. Data were analyzed using a negative binomial regression model.

Results: The study found that individuals with high levels of the Dark Triad trait of psychopathy post more selfies on social media than do individuals with low levels of the trait. The Dark Triad trait of narcissism was …

Psychopathy, Empathic Concern, And Emotional-Sentence Processing: An N400 Erp Study, Farren Larson

Student Theses

Using an undergraduate sample, the present study examined how psychopathic traits (assessed by the Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised) and empathic concern (assessed by the Interpersonal Reactivity Index) affect emotional-information processing using event-related potentials (ERPs) and a sentential priming paradigm. Participants had their electroencephalogram (EEG) recorded while they silently read sentences with three types of endings: congruent, incongruent, and emotionally negative. We hypothesized that participants with high levels of psychopathic traits and participants with low levels of empathic concern would find the emotionally negative sentence endings less unexpected and disturbing (yielding a smaller N400), compared to participants with low levels of psychopathic …

Bitter Taste Preference And Psychopathy: A Partial Replication Of Sagioglou And Greitemeyer, 2016, Lauren A. Waymire

Honors Program Theses

In this study, we did a partial replication of Sagioglou and Greitemeyer’s 2016 study concerning bitter taste preferences and malevolent personality traits. Undergraduate students (n=40, mean age=19.40, 75% females) completed a laboratory component consisting of 24 samples of 8 different solutions (sucrose, sodium chloride, quinine, and citric acid with a higher and lower concentration of each) for 3 iterations, as well as PTC testing and tongue staining in order to count fungiform papillae. This was followed by a survey component that utilized HEXACO (which assesses six major domains of personality) and the IPIP-NEO scale for psychopathy (measured with the factors …

Psychopathy And The Effect Of Imitation On Empathetic Pain, Emily N. Lasko

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Psychopathy is a disorder largely characterized by a marked deficit in empathy, however, the specificity and extent of the deficit is currently unclear. While it has been well-established in the literature that individuals higher in psychopathy tend to have intact Theory of Mind abilities and exhibit a deficient ability for affective empathy (Blair, 2005), the contribution of motor empathy to these abilities, particularly in regard to empathy for pain, has yet to be experimentally examined. Additionally, the possibility of imitation increasing motor empathic abilities has not been tested in this capacity. The goal of the current study was to further …

Facial Processing And Social Motivation In Psychopathy: An Event-Related Potential Study, Emily Dubose Sherman

Open Access Dissertations

Recent work has urged a shift in the perspective of psychopathy to focus on the interpersonal aspects of the disorder that are often overlooked in the broader literature. Conceptual and empirical overlap with an exemplar interpersonal disorder- autism spectrum disorder- lends support to viewing psychopathy as an interpersonal disorder; however, there are interpersonal dysfunctions associated with psychopathy that cannot be attributed wholly to overlap with autistic traits. The current study examined self-report measures, a lab task, and event-related potentials (ERPs) that are related to social, interpersonal functioning and motivation to help elucidate what aspects of psychopathy and ASD are overlapping …

The Dark Side Of Jealousy, Kristi A. Chin

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

A previous unpublished study found positive associations between jealousy (cognitive, emotional, behavioural) and the Dark Triad (narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy) (Raheb, Atkinson, Chin, Vernon, submitted). The present study investigates whether self-esteem and entitlement mediate these positive relationships. To test this question, 453 participants (311 females, 140 males, 2 other) between the age of 17 to 81 years (M = 33.19, SD = 10.32) completed the Multidimensional Jealousy Scale, the Short-D3, the Psychological Entitlement Scale, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. One model showed significant mediation: higher psychopathy was related to higher cognitive jealousy, and this relationship was significantly mediated by lower …

The Dark Triad And Hexaco Model Of Personality In Relational Aggression, Niki M. Knight

Master's Theses

Past research has linked relational aggression (RA) to many forms of psychological maladjustment among children and early adolescents. Although less is known about RA among emerging adults, there is a growing body of research demonstrating a number of adverse correlates. This literature has sparked an interest in examining the role of personality in RA. Most investigations to date have focused on the Five Factor Model; however, the six factor HEXACO model of personality (Ashton et al., 2004) may offer some advantages in studying RA. Moreover, the manipulative and often covert nature of RA among emerging adults has theoretical overlap with …

Making Decisions Affecting Oneself Versus Others: The Mediating Effect Of Interpersonal Closeness And Dark Triad Traits, Jessica R. Carre

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The payment incentives of portfolio managers and investors are often asymmetrical such that actions that benefit the portfolio manager can harm the client and vice-versa. Despite the presence and potential harm of these asymmetries, relatively little research has investigated self and other decision making broadly. There has also been few attempts to address the effect of reward asymmetries. Additionally, despite the presence of reward asymmetries not every portfolio manager will make risky decisions for their clients, which suggests the presence of an individual difference characteristic. This study addresses these knowledge gaps by examining the effect of interpersonally manipulative personality traits …

Interrelationships Between Sensation Seeking And Psychopathy, Casey S. Iwai

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Psychopathic and sensation seeking traits are often correlated; however, sensation seeking alone is not inherently pathological. This study seeks to investigate possible moderating variables between individuals who are high on sensation seeking but low on measures of psychopathic or antisocial traits. Specifically, a positive family environment is hypothesized to be a moderating variable in the development of psychopathic traits among high sensation seekers. A college student sample assessed for psychopathy, sensation seeking, and family functioning is used to test this hypothesis. Significant relationships between all three constructs were found. Similar to previous data, sensation seeking was found to correlate with …

Psychopathy And The Hexaco Personality Model, M. Todd Lobrano

Doctoral Dissertations

Within the recently published DSM-5, alternative diagnostic criteria for personality disorders have been offered (American Psychiatric Association [APA], 2013). These changes allow for a more dimensional diagnostic system than has been previously used while maintaining some aspects of a categorical system (Skodol et al., 2011). These changes also include a description of specific traits that characterize personality disorders and make it possible for measures of normal personality to have a more significant impact in their diagnosis. Relevant to the present study are the changes in the diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder and psychopathy, considered by many to be an extreme …

The Multicultural Study Of Psychopathy: An Examination Of Latin American Differences, Chelsea Spraberry Tekell

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Psychopathy is a personality disorder that is composed of characteristics that include poverty of empathy, lack of anxiety or fear, impulsive actions, and manipulation of others. The definition and measurement of psychopathy has changed over time and remains controversial. Ethnicity is an under researched area of psychopathy. In particular, previous psychopathy research has focused primarily on European American men. Despite increased attention to differences between African Americans and European Americans, Latin Americans continue to be overlooked, with only a small number of studies examining psychopathy among individuals from Latin ethnicities. The current study is among the first to examine psychopathy …

The Effects Of Psychopathy And Machiavellianism On Cognitive Dissonance, Ashley Anne Murray

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Psychopathic traits include a lack of guilt, a lack of remorse, callousness and antisocial behaviors such as impulsivity and aggression. The current study examined the effects of psychopathic traits as measured by the Psychopathic Personality Inventory - Revised: Short Form (PPI-R: SF; Lilienfeld & Widows, 2005) and the Levenson Primary and Secondary Psychopathy Scales (LPSP; Levenson, Kiehl, & Fitzpatrick, 1995), and of Machiavellianism (MACH), as measured by the MACH-IV (Christie & Geis, 1970), on cognitive dissonance in a sample of 164 participants. The induced compliance paradigm of cognitive dissonance was implemented by instructing each participant to complete a boring task …

Predicting Behavior From Psychopathic And Antisocial Personality Traits In A Student Sample., Maryann Stone

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Psychopathic personality is associated with a myriad of social and behavioral problems including violence, criminal activity, and overall failure to conform to social standards. In this study, psychopathic and antisocial personality traits are measured in a sample of college students via self-report surveys using questions derived from Hare's Psychopathic Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; 1991). Reliability and factor analyses were used to validate the inventory and create factor-based indices that were used to predict antisocial behavioral outcomes including violence, seeking revenge on persecutors, and suicidal ideation, in addition to other analogous and deviant behaviors. Findings showed a relationship between personality and behavior indicating …