Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

A Functional Perspective On Everyday Sadism, Marley Russell

Psychology ETDs

Everyday sadism is thus far a poorly operationalized personality trait. In its current conceptualization it offers predictive value for aggressive behavior over and above the effects of other antisocial personality traits. To improve the utility of this potentially critical predictor of socially undesirable behavior I conducted an exploratory study that more precisely examines its psychometric structure and informs its evolutionary significance. Due to the scarcity of research on everyday sadism (which is additionally limited by the trait’s poor operationalization) I suggest a functional hypothesis for its evolution based largely on theoretical reasoning. I propose this hypothesis for everyday sadism with …