The dark side of the human person has long been of keen interest among psychologists and ordinary people. Research has linked unpleasant human traits such as selfishness and lack of empathy with higher income and higher dating chances. However, this point of view is beginning to be strongly criticized. Scientists even argue that this kind of findings could have disastrous consequences.
In the new study, scientists argue that these kinds of conclusions are often superficial, statistically unjustified, and represent an overly simplistic view of human nature. Worse, they say they can be detrimental in the real world because they downplay the harm that those possessing these "dark" qualities can do to society.
“We have every reason to be concerned,” says Josh Miller, a clinical psychologist at Georgia State University in Athens. Researchers, he said, focused on "attention-grabbing, provocative work, rather irresponsibly in interpreting the data."
Criticism is aimed at exploring the so-called dark triad of personalities. Two Canadian psychologists coined the term in 2002 to combine Machiavellianism, narcissism and psychopathy - which are characterized by callousness, manipulativeness and lack of empathy. Thousands of articles have been published on the topic since then, with 1,700 published last year alone.
To cover the whole triad, researchers usually ask people to agree or disagree with statements like "I'm being compared to celebrities" or "it's unwise to reveal my secrets."
Then, some studies attempted to link the dark triad score given by individual volunteer respondents to their real-world metrics such as salary, sexual behavior, and attitudes toward colleagues. Many studies of this kind have been picked up by the press, featuring headlines from the series Why A Little Bad Worth It and Republicans Show More Psychopathic Traits than Democrats.
Companies also took part in this promotion. In 2016, a UK firm was looking for a "Psychopathic First Class New Business Media Sales Executive!" Salary 50-110 thousand pounds sterling. " The ad said that one in five CEOs has psychopathic traits and the company wants to find someone with "positive qualities that are inherent in people of this kind."
However, research into the dark triad is often too superficial to draw any meaningful conclusions from it, says Miller, who - along with his colleagues - has severely criticized the area by publishing his observations on the PsyArXiv preprint server. This analysis will be published soon in the journal Current Directions in Psychological Science.
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Part of the problem, Miller said, is that these studies typically use only a few criteria to categorize a person, for example, as narcissists, Machiavellians, and psychopaths, whereas standard tests require dozens of criteria to justify at least one of these designations. … In addition, he notes, most research on the dark triad is conducted with a narrow circle of respondents, for example, students who need credit, which raises doubts about whether these results can be applied widely, including to cases in the workplace.
The biggest flaw in dark triad research, however, is that it can oversimplify personality traits, Miller says, with so few criteria used in tests. Research can classify a person as a narcissist because, for example, they exhibit high self-esteem, although many narcissistic attitudes - including the tendency to view others as rivals - are actually due to low self-esteem. And the way scientists measure Machiavellianism in dark triad research is controversial because it's too different from the methods of clinical experts in the field, he adds. According to Miller, it is necessary to take research on the dark triad "to a qualitatively new level."
Delroy Paulhus, a psychologist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada and co-author of the original "dark triad" idea, rejects many of Miller's criticisms. For example, he says that a simplified version of the personality test should be used to work with the general population. “This kind of criticism is possible on any personality scale,” he says. Miller and others who disagree with the idea of the dark triad are “outraged by its popularity,” Paulhus said.
Minna Lyons, a psychologist at the University of Liverpool (UK) and author of a new book on the dark triad, admits that this area of research looks rather "chaotic". But she blames sloppy psychologists for this rather than the fundamentally weak sides of the idea itself. Lyons says her work shows that psychopathy and Machiavellianism can fit neatly into the dark triad concept.
Paulhus agrees with Miller that dark triad researchers need to work with a wider pool of volunteers. According to him, scientists in this field should make more efforts to confirm the personal qualities of the informants - this can be achieved by reinforcing the information of the subjects about themselves with the opinions of their friends. "A lot of research on the dark triad is not particularly successful."
All of this could help correct the misconceptions we deal with in the real world, says Ernest O'Boyle, assistant professor of management at the Kelly School of Business at Indiana University at Bloomington. Many in the business community, he said, have been seduced by the idea - spread through superficial discussions of the topic in the research literature - that dark triad traits, including psychopathy, such as a willingness to take risks, can give a person benefits and influence hiring decisions. …
"The tendency to celebrate those behaviors and attitudes that are inherently harmful to society is potentially destructive," says O'Boyle. It is unlikely, he adds, "you would like to see a psychopathic person at the head of the company."
David Adam
