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Mindreading in the dark: Dark personality features and theory of mind
Personality and Individual Differences 87 (2015) 50–54
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Personality and Individual Differences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid
Mindreading in the dark: Dark personality features and theory of mind Jennifer Vonk a,⁎, Virgil Zeigler-Hill a, Demitrus Ewing a, Sterett Mercer b, Amy E. Noser c a b c
Oakland University, United States University of British Columbia, Canada University of Kansas, United States
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history: Received 21 May 2015 Received in revised form 15 July 2015 Accepted 16 July 2015 Available online xxxx Keywords: Dark Triad Vulnerable Dark Triad Theory of mind Emotional intelligence
a b s t r a c t Theory of mind may be associated with “dark” personality features because these features are defined in part by lack of concern for the feelings of others. Participants completed measures of dark personality features as well as various indicators of theory of mind (ToM). The most consistent negative associations with ToM emerged for primary and secondary psychopathy. In contrast, individuals with high levels of grandiose narcissism were relatively skilled at emotion management and more advanced ToM. These findings suggest that individuals with some dark personality features may misread rather than disregard the feelings and intentions of others. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
1. Introduction Dark personality features refer to socially aversive aspects of personality that are often linked with antagonistic behaviors and callousness (e.g., Paulhus & Williams, 2002). Despite several recent studies investigating the connections between these features and the ability to understand the mental experiences of others, the social cognitive capabilities of individuals with dark personality features remain unclear. Researchers have focused most extensively on the distinction between cognitive and affective empathy, with cognitive empathy referring to the capacity to discern emotional states in others, and affective empathy referring to the capacity to feel what another is feeling through emotional contagion (e.g., Czarna, Wróbel, Dufner, & Zeigler-Hill, 2015; Jonason, Lyons, Bethell, & Ross, 2013). Theory of mind (ToM) is closely aligned with cognitive empathy but is defined more broadly as the capacity to represent and reason about various mental states in others — including knowledge states, motivations, intentions, and beliefs. Although individuals possessing dark personality features show relatively little concern for the welfare of others, there is surprisingly little data to support the idea that such lack of concern stems from an inability to understand others' feelings. For example, individuals with dark personality features have the capacity to reason about emotions but fail to utilize this ability to invoke empathic responses (Ritter et al., 2011; Wai & Tiliopoulos, 2012). To examine the connections between dark
⁎ Corresponding author at: Department of Psychology, Oakland University, 211 Pryale Hall, Rochester, MI 48309, United States. E-mail address: [email protected] (J. Vonk).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2015.07.025 0191-8869/Published by Elsevier Ltd.
personality traits and several aspects of ToM, we included both traditional measures of emotion reading and emotional intelligence, which incorporate emotion understanding and management, as well as ToM tasks that assessed the attribution of intentions and second-order ToM (i.e., the ability to understand that someone else has thoughts about someone else's thoughts). This allowed us to identify more specific social cognitive deficits in individuals with varying levels of dark personality features. We also included assessment of a broad array of dark personality features in the present study, such as the Dark Triad (i.e., Machiavellianism, grandiose narcissism, primary psychopathy; Paulhus & Williams, 2002), and the ‘Vulnerable Dark Triad’ (i.e., vulnerable narcissism, secondary psychopathy, and borderline personality features; Miller et al., 2010). Although previous studies concerning the darker aspects of personality have often been limited to the Dark Triad, we also included the Vulnerable Dark Triad because difficulties assessing the mental states of others may contribute to the emotional reactivity that characterizes individuals who possess these traits. Dark personality features appear to be linked by shared aspects such as empathy deficits (Paulhus & Williams, 2002) and a willingness to exploit others (e.g., Jonason & Webster, 2012). Individuals with relatively poor ToM skills may be more likely to misread or dismiss the feelings and intentions of others, which may contribute to their likelihood of engaging in aversive behaviors. This possibility is consistent with the results of the growing body of studies suggesting that some dark personality features are associated with impoverished ToM skills (e.g., Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010; Dziobek et al., 2011; Lyons, Caldwell, & Shultz, 2010; Preibler, Dziobek, Ritter, Heekeren, & Roepke, 2010; van Zwieten et al., 2013; Vonk, Zeigler-Hill, Mayhew, & Mercer, 2013).
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However, dark personality features are not always associated with impaired ToM. For example, both null and positive associations with ToM have emerged for certain aspects of psychopathy (Dolan & Fullam, 2004; Richell et al., 2003), Machiavellianism (Barlow, Qualter, & Stylianou, 2010; Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012; Wastell & Booth, 2003), narcissism (Stellwagen & Kerig, 2013), and borderline personality features (Arntz, Bernstein, Oorschot, & Schobre, 2009; Franzen et al., 2011; Schilling et al., 2012). These mixed results may be due to the different ways in which both dark personality features and ToM have been conceptualized. ToM allows perceivers to predict subsequent behavior of others based on their internal states, which may be useful when manipulating, deceiving, and taking advantage of others (Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012). Nagler, Reiter, Furtner, and Rauthmann (2014) have recently provided evidence that individuals high in Dark Triad personality traits use emotional intelligence to manipulate others. Thus, it would be useful to include measures of knowledge and intention attribution, as well as emotional intelligence, which encompasses the ability to both understand and manage one's own emotions in contexts that relate to the emotions and intentions of others. Individuals with high levels of narcissism (Ames & Kammrath, 2004), Machiavellianism (Giammarco, Atkinson, Baughman, Veselka, & Vernon, 2013; Klaver, Lee, Spidel, & Hart, 2009), and borderline traits (Schilling et al., 2012) have reported a higher degree of confidence in their responses to ToM tasks than other individuals despite the fact that their actual performance was not superior. Such findings point to the need to assess ToM using actual tests of the ability to interpret emotions and intentions of others rather than focusing on self-perceptions. Most previous studies with adults have used only a single indicator of ToM that captured only low-level ToM abilities (e.g., the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test [RMET]; Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010; van Zwieten et al., 2013; Vonk et al., 2013). Preibler et al. (2010) found deficits in ToM in patients with borderline personality disorder using a more sensitive and ecologically valid task (Movie for the Assessment of Social Cognition, Dziobek et al., 2006) even though they did not differ from normal control participants on the RMET. These results emphasize the need to employ more advanced measures of ToM because it is important to determine whether individuals with dark personality features are unable to take the feelings and perspectives of others into account or are simply unwilling to do so (e.g., Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010). We used various ToM tasks in order to gain a more nuanced understanding of specific ToM deficits for individuals with dark personality features. In addition to including broader measures of dark personality that captured vulnerability as well as antagonistic features, we examined the various facets of narcissism and psychopathy because these facets may differ in their associations with ToM (Jonason & Krause, 2013; Sharp & Vanwoerden, 2014; Vonk et al., 2013). Previous studies concerning the Dark Triad and ToM have often treated narcissism and psychopathy as unidimensional constructs even though they are most often characterized as being multidimensional. For example, it has been suggested that there are two forms of psychopathy: Primary psychopathy is considered to reflect characteristics such as selfishness, callousness, superficial charm, chronic lying, and lack of remorse, whereas secondary psychopathy is characterized by an antisocial lifestyle, which includes susceptibility to boredom, impulsivity, early behavior problems, and tendencies toward delinquency (Hare, 1991). We predicted that borderline personality features, secondary psychopathy, and vulnerable narcissism would be associated with impairments in ToM and emotional intelligence, whereas grandiose narcissism, primary psychopathy, and Machiavellianism would be associated with higher levels of ToM and emotional intelligence. These predictions are consistent with the abilities of individuals with these personality features to manipulate others and these associations have been supported by previous findings (e.g., Barlow et al., 2010; Dolan & Fullam, 2004; Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012; Richell et al., 2003; Stellwagen & Kerig, 2013; Wastell & Booth, 2003).
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2. Method 2.1. Participants and procedure Participants were 929 undergraduates (764 women) at a university in the Midwestern region of the United States who participated in return for course credit. We omitted data from an additional 27 participants who contributed nonsensical responses to open-ended questions. Participants completed measures of dark personality features and ToM via a secure website. The mean age of the participants was 20.4 years (SD = 4.57) and their racial/ethnic composition was 76% White, 9% Black, 3% Hispanic, 4% Asian, and 8% other. 2.2. Measures 2.2.1. Mach-IV Machiavellianism was measured with the Mach-IV (Christie & Geis, 1970). The Mach-IV is a 20-item instrument that was developed to measure manipulative and deceitful tendencies as well as cynical and immoral beliefs (e.g., “The best way to handle people is to tell them what they want to hear”). Participants were asked to rate their level of agreement with the items of the Mach-IV using scales that ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The Mach-IV has been found to possess adequate psychometric properties and it is the most widely used measure of Machiavellianism (McHoskey, Worzel, & Szyarto, 1998), ordinal α = .75. 2.2.2. Pathological narcissism inventory Narcissism was assessed with the Pathological Narcissism Inventory (PNI; Pincus et al., 2009). The PNI is a 52-item instrument that assesses seven dimensions of pathological narcissism spanning problems with narcissistic grandiosity (i.e., exploitativeness, grandiose fantasy, selfsacrificing, self-enhancement; e.g., “I find it easy to manipulate people” [ordinal α = .90]) and narcissistic vulnerability (i.e., entitlement rage, contingent self-esteem, hiding the self, and devaluing; e.g., “My selfesteem fluctuates a lot” [ordinal α = .96]). Responses were provided on scales that ranged from 0 (not at all like me) to 5 (very much like me). The PNI has been found to possess adequate psychometric properties (Pincus et al., 2009). 2.2.3. Levenson self-report psychopathy scale Psychopathy was measured using the Levenson Self-Report Psychopathy Scale (LSRPS; Levenson, Kiehl, & Fitzpatrick, 1995), which was designed specifically to measure psychopathy in the general population and is based on the two-factor interpretation of Hare's revised Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-R; Hare, 1991). The LSRPS consists of 26 items and responses were provided on scales that ranged from 1 (disagree strongly) to 4 (agree strongly). This version of the instrument consists of two subscales: Primary Psychopathy (16 items; e.g., “For me, what's right is whatever I can get away with” [ordinal α = .84]) and Secondary Psychopathy (10 items; e.g., “I find myself in the same kinds of trouble, time after time” [ordinal α = .78]). 2.2.4. Borderline personality features The Borderline Features Scale of the Personality Assessment Inventory (Morey, 1991) is a 24-item scale that captures four commonly agreed upon components of borderline personality functioning: affective instability, identity problems, negative relationships, and selfharm. Responses were made on scales that ranged from 0 (false, not at all true) to 3 (very true). This instrument has been shown to possess strong psychometric properties (Morey, 1991; Morey & Glutting, 1994), ordinal α = .89. 2.2.5. Theory of mind measures Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test. The RMET (Baron-Cohen, Wheelwright, & Hill, 2001) was used to assess the ability of participants
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Table 1 Intercorrelations and descriptive statistics for dark personality features and indicators of theory of mind. 1 1. Machiavellianism 2. PNI Grandiosity 3. PNI Vulnerability 4. LSRPS Primary Psychopathy 5. LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy 6. Borderline Personality Features 7. Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test 8. Situational Test of Emotion Management 9. Situational Test of Emotion Understanding 10. Hinting Task 11. Imposing Memory Test M SD
– .08⁎ .33⁎⁎⁎ .47⁎⁎⁎ .49⁎⁎⁎ .35⁎⁎⁎ −.09⁎⁎ −.32⁎⁎⁎ −.19⁎⁎⁎ −.11⁎⁎⁎ −.14⁎⁎⁎ 2.63 0.40
2 – .60⁎⁎⁎ .16⁎⁎ .14⁎⁎⁎ .24⁎⁎⁎ .00 .10⁎ −.05 .09⁎ −.03 3.25 0.70
3
– .36⁎⁎⁎ .47⁎⁎⁎ .59⁎⁎⁎ −.06 −.16⁎⁎⁎ −.15⁎⁎⁎ −.03 −.14⁎⁎⁎ 2.76 0.73
4
5
6
7
– .57⁎⁎⁎ .30⁎⁎⁎ −.31⁎⁎⁎ −.47⁎⁎⁎ −.40⁎⁎ −.21⁎⁎⁎ −.24⁎⁎⁎
– .58⁎⁎⁎ −.22⁎⁎⁎ −.39⁎⁎⁎ −.30⁎⁎⁎ −.10⁎⁎ −.20⁎⁎⁎
– −.05 −.14⁎⁎⁎ −.14⁎⁎⁎ −.08⁎ −.09⁎⁎
– .42⁎⁎⁎ .53⁎⁎⁎ .27⁎⁎⁎ .34⁎⁎⁎
2.06 0.42
2.06 0.47
1.19 0.44
24.32 4.53
8
9
10
11
– .62⁎⁎⁎ .22⁎⁎⁎ .39⁎⁎⁎ 2.23 0.43
– .30⁎⁎⁎ .48⁎⁎⁎ 0.54 0.17
– .21⁎⁎⁎ 7.78 1.55
– 2.77 0.43
Note. PNI = pathological narcissism inventory; and LSRPS = Levenson self-report psychopathy scale. ⁎p b .05; ⁎⁎p b .01; and ⁎⁎⁎p b .001.
to interpret the emotional expressions of adults using only images of their eye regions. The test consists of 36 photographic images of different individuals' eyes portraying different emotions. Participants were asked to make a forced-choice decision between four options as to which best described the state of mind of the individual in the photograph. Scores were calculated as the total number of correct responses with a maximum of 36 (range = 10–36). The Situational Test of Emotion Management (STEM; MacCann & Roberts, 2008) was developed to assess advanced emotional intelligence. Scores are relevant to the perception of others' emotions and indicates the ability to utilize such understanding to adjust one's own behavior. It includes 20 multiple-choice items in which participants select an action they would recommend for a character in a given scenario. Items are scored based on the adaptive value of the chosen response. For the present study, the internal consistency of this measure was ordinal α = .83. The Situational Test of Emotion Understanding (STEU; MacCann & Roberts, 2008) was developed to assess advanced emotional intelligence and focuses on the ability to read the emotions of others. The STEU contains 42 statements about work-related and personal scenarios. Participants were asked to indicate which of five emotions was most likely to have occurred in each scenario. Responses were scored from 0–4 based on the best-match to the situation. The internal consistency of this measure was ordinal α = .91 for the present study. The Hinting Task (Corcoran, Mercer, & Frith, 1995) was developed to assess the ability of participants to infer the intentions of speakers in ten, brief, indirect utterances that they read prior to answering the question, “What did the speaker intend to say?” The participant received a score of 1 for correct answers and a score of 0 for incorrect answers. Previous studies involving participants with mental disorders have sometimes provided clues if the first response was not correct (e.g., Corcoran et al., 1995) but we did not provide clues about the correct answer because our sample consisted of typical adults. Scores constituted the number of correct responses out of 10. The Imposing Memory Test was developed to assess an advanced form of theory of mind (Kinderman, Dunbar, & Bentall, 1998). It contains five short stories with a series of 20 true/false questions following each short story. The participants were asked to respond from memory and were scored regarding the accuracy of their response. Some of the questions asked about first- or second-order mental states of characters and were scored at a higher level for higher-order mental states. Scores on the questions were summed, ordinal α = .86. 3. Results Table 1 displays the correlations for the variables included in the present study along with their descriptive statistics. Table 2 displays the results of hierarchical multiple regression analyses in which each
measure of ToM was regressed onto the dark personality features. This regression approach is consistent with the approach that has been used most often with the Dark Triad because it identifies the distinctive and unique variance in each measure of ToM that is explained by each dark personality feature (Furnham, Richards, Rangel, & Jones, 2014). 1
3.1. RMET Machiavellianism was positively associated with performance (β = .08, t = 2.00, p = .05), whereas LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = −.29, t = − 7.31, p b .001) and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = − .15, t = − 3.25, p = .001) were negatively associated with performance on the RMET. It is important to note that Machiavellianism had a negative zero-order correlation with the RMET which is indicative of a suppressor effect.
3.2. STEM PNI Grandiosity was positively associated with performance on the STEM (β = .23, t = 5.72, p b .001), whereas Machiavellianism (β = − .08, t = − 2.02, p = .04), PNI Vulnerability (β = − .10, t = − 1.95, p = .05), LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = − .36, t = − 8.34, p b .001), and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = − .16, t = − 3.21, p = .001) were negatively associated with scores on the STEM.
3.3. STEU LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = − .35, t = − 8.87, p b .001), and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = −.13, t = −2.80, p = .005) were negatively associated with scores on the STEU.
3.4. Hinting task PNI Grandiosity (β = .15, t = 3.60, p b .001) was positively associated with performance on the Hinting Task, whereas LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = −.24, t = −5.67, p b .001) was negatively associated with performance on this measure. 1 Preliminary analyses included sex as a potential moderator of the associations that the dark personality features had with ToM. However, those analyses indicated only one significant interaction: PNI Vulnerability × sex for the analysis concerning the STEM (β = −.31, t = −2.39, p = .02). Simple slopes tests revealed that the association between PNI Vulnerability and the STEM was significant for men (β = −.33, t = −2.79, p = .01) but not for women (β = −.06, t = −0.91, p = .37). In the interest of parsimony, we did not include sex in the final analyses so it will not be discussed further.
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Table 2 Regression of the indicators of theory of mind onto the dark personality features.
Model Machiavellianism PNI Grandiosity PNI Vulnerability LSRPS Primary Psychopathy LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy Borderline Personality Features
Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test
Situational Test of Emotion Management
Situational Test of Emotion Understanding
Hinting Task
R2
R2
R2
R2
.11⁎⁎⁎
β .08⁎ .03 .02 −.29⁎⁎⁎ −.15⁎⁎⁎ .08
.29⁎⁎⁎
β −.08⁎ .23⁎⁎⁎ −.10⁎ −.36⁎⁎⁎ −.16⁎⁎⁎
β
.17⁎⁎⁎
R2
β
.07⁎⁎⁎ .01 .02 .01 −.35⁎⁎⁎ −.13⁎⁎
.08
Imposing Memory Test
.02
β
.07⁎⁎⁎ .02 .15⁎⁎⁎ −.01 −.24⁎⁎⁎ .07 −.07
−.00 .06 −.09 −.17⁎⁎⁎ −.10⁎ .06
Note. PNI = pathological narcissism inventory; and LSRPS = Levenson self-report psychopathy scale. ⁎p b .05; ⁎⁎p b .01; and ⁎⁎⁎p b .001.
3.5. Imposing memory test LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = − .17, t = − 4.22, p b .001) and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = − .10, t = − 2.15, p = .03) were both negatively associated with performance on the Imposing Memory Test.
4. Discussion The zero-order correlations revealed that the dark personality features – except for PNI Grandiosity – had reasonably consistent negative associations with the indicators of ToM. Certain dark personality features (e.g., LSRPS Primary and Secondary Psychopathy) were found to have unique negative associations with various aspects of ToM, whereas previous studies had revealed negative, positive, and no associations (Barlow et al., 2010; Dolan & Fullam, 2004; Dziobek et al., 2006; Preibler et al., 2010; Richell et al., 2003; Wastell & Booth, 2003). This suggests that the ToM deficits that characterize individuals with primary and secondary forms of psychopathy may be relatively broad in their scope. Previous studies had also found mixed results for Machiavellianism (Barlow et al., 2010; Wastell & Booth, 2003) but we found a unique positive association between Machiavellianism and the RMET in the present study, which is consistent with some previous findings (Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012). However, it should be noted that Machiavellianism displayed negative zero-order associations with ToM and that the positive associations with the RMET emerged in the regression model only after controlling for the overlap that Machiavellianism had with the other dark personality features. Callousness and manipulation may be at the core of the antagonistic dark personality features (Jones & Figueredo, 2013). Once this “core” is accounted for in these analyses, the remaining aspect of Machiavellianism (perhaps immorality and cynicism) has a positive association with the ability to read emotion states captured by the RMET. This may explain the inconsistent results that have emerged in previous studies that have examined the associations between Machiavellianism and indicators of ToM. PNI Grandiosity was positively associated with both emotional intelligence and ToM, which is also consistent with previous research (Vonk et al., 2013). These results support the idea that individuals high in PNI Grandiosity may benefit from a heightened ability to understand the mental states of others, which may allow them to be more effective at interpersonal manipulation. In contrast, primary and secondary psychopathy showed negative associations with both emotion understanding and emotion management, which may be indicative of a more general social cognitive deficit. Of the Vulnerable Dark Triad personality features, LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy was negatively associated with all measures except for the Hinting Task, whereas vulnerable narcissism was only modestly negatively associated with emotion management. Borderline personality
features were not associated with ToM. These findings are consistent with the results of some (e.g., Franzen et al., 2011; Schilling et al., 2012) but not all prior studies (e.g., Dziobek et al., 2011; Miller et al., 2010; Preibler et al., 2010; Vonk et al., 2013). The results from the present study reveal a pattern suggesting that antagonistic dark personality features (with the exception of grandiose narcissism) tend to have negative associations with certain aspects of ToM, whereas vulnerable dark personality features (with the exception of secondary psychopathy) do not. These results may help clarify previous contradictory findings regarding the relationship between dark personality features and the ability to understand and interpret the mental states of others. Some dark personality features (e.g., psychopathy) are associated with deficits in recognizing and reasoning about the mental states of others, whereas other dark personality features (e.g., grandiose narcissism) may be associated with ToM skills that would be beneficial for exploiting others, such as the ability to manage their own emotions. Individuals who are better able to both read the thoughts of others and control their own emotions display a combination of abilities that may be particularly advantageous when manipulating others. Although the present study had a number of strengths (e.g., large sample size, various dark personality features, multi-method assessment of ToM), a potential limitation was that the sample consisted of college students. As a result, we are unable to draw conclusions about the associations between dark personality features and ToM for individuals who meet diagnostic criteria for certain forms of psychopathology (e.g., narcissistic personality disorder). However, given that dark personality features vary substantially in nonclinical samples, examining the associations between dark personality features and various indicators of ToM in the present sample extends previous work in this area. It is also important to note that the present sample consisted predominantly of women, which may preclude generalizing these effects to men. Another potential limitation is that we were unable to determine whether there is a causal link between dark personality features and various components of ToM due to the correlational nature of the data. Thus, it is unclear whether specific ToM deficits contribute to the development of dark personality features or if there is another explanation for their associations such as neurological impairments. Future research should include an even broader array of dark personality features (e.g., greed, sadism, spitefulness). Our results suggest that future studies will be more informative if they attempt to tease apart specific personality traits and their associations with particular social cognitive impairments. Recent research has demonstrated the benefits of such a strategy when examining the associations that Dark Triad traits have with emotion deficiencies (Jonason & Krause, 2013) and social cognition (Sharp & Vanwoerden, 2014). Our study builds on these findings by including a broader array of dark personality features and ToM components. By adopting this strategy, we were able to determine whether individuals with elevated levels of particular dark personality features suffer from specific ToM deficits.
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Personality and Individual Differences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid
Mindreading in the dark: Dark personality features and theory of mind Jennifer Vonk a,⁎, Virgil Zeigler-Hill a, Demitrus Ewing a, Sterett Mercer b, Amy E. Noser c a b c
Oakland University, United States University of British Columbia, Canada University of Kansas, United States
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history: Received 21 May 2015 Received in revised form 15 July 2015 Accepted 16 July 2015 Available online xxxx Keywords: Dark Triad Vulnerable Dark Triad Theory of mind Emotional intelligence
a b s t r a c t Theory of mind may be associated with “dark” personality features because these features are defined in part by lack of concern for the feelings of others. Participants completed measures of dark personality features as well as various indicators of theory of mind (ToM). The most consistent negative associations with ToM emerged for primary and secondary psychopathy. In contrast, individuals with high levels of grandiose narcissism were relatively skilled at emotion management and more advanced ToM. These findings suggest that individuals with some dark personality features may misread rather than disregard the feelings and intentions of others. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
1. Introduction Dark personality features refer to socially aversive aspects of personality that are often linked with antagonistic behaviors and callousness (e.g., Paulhus & Williams, 2002). Despite several recent studies investigating the connections between these features and the ability to understand the mental experiences of others, the social cognitive capabilities of individuals with dark personality features remain unclear. Researchers have focused most extensively on the distinction between cognitive and affective empathy, with cognitive empathy referring to the capacity to discern emotional states in others, and affective empathy referring to the capacity to feel what another is feeling through emotional contagion (e.g., Czarna, Wróbel, Dufner, & Zeigler-Hill, 2015; Jonason, Lyons, Bethell, & Ross, 2013). Theory of mind (ToM) is closely aligned with cognitive empathy but is defined more broadly as the capacity to represent and reason about various mental states in others — including knowledge states, motivations, intentions, and beliefs. Although individuals possessing dark personality features show relatively little concern for the welfare of others, there is surprisingly little data to support the idea that such lack of concern stems from an inability to understand others' feelings. For example, individuals with dark personality features have the capacity to reason about emotions but fail to utilize this ability to invoke empathic responses (Ritter et al., 2011; Wai & Tiliopoulos, 2012). To examine the connections between dark
⁎ Corresponding author at: Department of Psychology, Oakland University, 211 Pryale Hall, Rochester, MI 48309, United States. E-mail address: [email protected] (J. Vonk).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2015.07.025 0191-8869/Published by Elsevier Ltd.
personality traits and several aspects of ToM, we included both traditional measures of emotion reading and emotional intelligence, which incorporate emotion understanding and management, as well as ToM tasks that assessed the attribution of intentions and second-order ToM (i.e., the ability to understand that someone else has thoughts about someone else's thoughts). This allowed us to identify more specific social cognitive deficits in individuals with varying levels of dark personality features. We also included assessment of a broad array of dark personality features in the present study, such as the Dark Triad (i.e., Machiavellianism, grandiose narcissism, primary psychopathy; Paulhus & Williams, 2002), and the ‘Vulnerable Dark Triad’ (i.e., vulnerable narcissism, secondary psychopathy, and borderline personality features; Miller et al., 2010). Although previous studies concerning the darker aspects of personality have often been limited to the Dark Triad, we also included the Vulnerable Dark Triad because difficulties assessing the mental states of others may contribute to the emotional reactivity that characterizes individuals who possess these traits. Dark personality features appear to be linked by shared aspects such as empathy deficits (Paulhus & Williams, 2002) and a willingness to exploit others (e.g., Jonason & Webster, 2012). Individuals with relatively poor ToM skills may be more likely to misread or dismiss the feelings and intentions of others, which may contribute to their likelihood of engaging in aversive behaviors. This possibility is consistent with the results of the growing body of studies suggesting that some dark personality features are associated with impoverished ToM skills (e.g., Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010; Dziobek et al., 2011; Lyons, Caldwell, & Shultz, 2010; Preibler, Dziobek, Ritter, Heekeren, & Roepke, 2010; van Zwieten et al., 2013; Vonk, Zeigler-Hill, Mayhew, & Mercer, 2013).
J. Vonk et al. / Personality and Individual Differences 87 (2015) 50–54
However, dark personality features are not always associated with impaired ToM. For example, both null and positive associations with ToM have emerged for certain aspects of psychopathy (Dolan & Fullam, 2004; Richell et al., 2003), Machiavellianism (Barlow, Qualter, & Stylianou, 2010; Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012; Wastell & Booth, 2003), narcissism (Stellwagen & Kerig, 2013), and borderline personality features (Arntz, Bernstein, Oorschot, & Schobre, 2009; Franzen et al., 2011; Schilling et al., 2012). These mixed results may be due to the different ways in which both dark personality features and ToM have been conceptualized. ToM allows perceivers to predict subsequent behavior of others based on their internal states, which may be useful when manipulating, deceiving, and taking advantage of others (Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012). Nagler, Reiter, Furtner, and Rauthmann (2014) have recently provided evidence that individuals high in Dark Triad personality traits use emotional intelligence to manipulate others. Thus, it would be useful to include measures of knowledge and intention attribution, as well as emotional intelligence, which encompasses the ability to both understand and manage one's own emotions in contexts that relate to the emotions and intentions of others. Individuals with high levels of narcissism (Ames & Kammrath, 2004), Machiavellianism (Giammarco, Atkinson, Baughman, Veselka, & Vernon, 2013; Klaver, Lee, Spidel, & Hart, 2009), and borderline traits (Schilling et al., 2012) have reported a higher degree of confidence in their responses to ToM tasks than other individuals despite the fact that their actual performance was not superior. Such findings point to the need to assess ToM using actual tests of the ability to interpret emotions and intentions of others rather than focusing on self-perceptions. Most previous studies with adults have used only a single indicator of ToM that captured only low-level ToM abilities (e.g., the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test [RMET]; Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010; van Zwieten et al., 2013; Vonk et al., 2013). Preibler et al. (2010) found deficits in ToM in patients with borderline personality disorder using a more sensitive and ecologically valid task (Movie for the Assessment of Social Cognition, Dziobek et al., 2006) even though they did not differ from normal control participants on the RMET. These results emphasize the need to employ more advanced measures of ToM because it is important to determine whether individuals with dark personality features are unable to take the feelings and perspectives of others into account or are simply unwilling to do so (e.g., Ali & Chamorro-Premuzic, 2010). We used various ToM tasks in order to gain a more nuanced understanding of specific ToM deficits for individuals with dark personality features. In addition to including broader measures of dark personality that captured vulnerability as well as antagonistic features, we examined the various facets of narcissism and psychopathy because these facets may differ in their associations with ToM (Jonason & Krause, 2013; Sharp & Vanwoerden, 2014; Vonk et al., 2013). Previous studies concerning the Dark Triad and ToM have often treated narcissism and psychopathy as unidimensional constructs even though they are most often characterized as being multidimensional. For example, it has been suggested that there are two forms of psychopathy: Primary psychopathy is considered to reflect characteristics such as selfishness, callousness, superficial charm, chronic lying, and lack of remorse, whereas secondary psychopathy is characterized by an antisocial lifestyle, which includes susceptibility to boredom, impulsivity, early behavior problems, and tendencies toward delinquency (Hare, 1991). We predicted that borderline personality features, secondary psychopathy, and vulnerable narcissism would be associated with impairments in ToM and emotional intelligence, whereas grandiose narcissism, primary psychopathy, and Machiavellianism would be associated with higher levels of ToM and emotional intelligence. These predictions are consistent with the abilities of individuals with these personality features to manipulate others and these associations have been supported by previous findings (e.g., Barlow et al., 2010; Dolan & Fullam, 2004; Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012; Richell et al., 2003; Stellwagen & Kerig, 2013; Wastell & Booth, 2003).
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2. Method 2.1. Participants and procedure Participants were 929 undergraduates (764 women) at a university in the Midwestern region of the United States who participated in return for course credit. We omitted data from an additional 27 participants who contributed nonsensical responses to open-ended questions. Participants completed measures of dark personality features and ToM via a secure website. The mean age of the participants was 20.4 years (SD = 4.57) and their racial/ethnic composition was 76% White, 9% Black, 3% Hispanic, 4% Asian, and 8% other. 2.2. Measures 2.2.1. Mach-IV Machiavellianism was measured with the Mach-IV (Christie & Geis, 1970). The Mach-IV is a 20-item instrument that was developed to measure manipulative and deceitful tendencies as well as cynical and immoral beliefs (e.g., “The best way to handle people is to tell them what they want to hear”). Participants were asked to rate their level of agreement with the items of the Mach-IV using scales that ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The Mach-IV has been found to possess adequate psychometric properties and it is the most widely used measure of Machiavellianism (McHoskey, Worzel, & Szyarto, 1998), ordinal α = .75. 2.2.2. Pathological narcissism inventory Narcissism was assessed with the Pathological Narcissism Inventory (PNI; Pincus et al., 2009). The PNI is a 52-item instrument that assesses seven dimensions of pathological narcissism spanning problems with narcissistic grandiosity (i.e., exploitativeness, grandiose fantasy, selfsacrificing, self-enhancement; e.g., “I find it easy to manipulate people” [ordinal α = .90]) and narcissistic vulnerability (i.e., entitlement rage, contingent self-esteem, hiding the self, and devaluing; e.g., “My selfesteem fluctuates a lot” [ordinal α = .96]). Responses were provided on scales that ranged from 0 (not at all like me) to 5 (very much like me). The PNI has been found to possess adequate psychometric properties (Pincus et al., 2009). 2.2.3. Levenson self-report psychopathy scale Psychopathy was measured using the Levenson Self-Report Psychopathy Scale (LSRPS; Levenson, Kiehl, & Fitzpatrick, 1995), which was designed specifically to measure psychopathy in the general population and is based on the two-factor interpretation of Hare's revised Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-R; Hare, 1991). The LSRPS consists of 26 items and responses were provided on scales that ranged from 1 (disagree strongly) to 4 (agree strongly). This version of the instrument consists of two subscales: Primary Psychopathy (16 items; e.g., “For me, what's right is whatever I can get away with” [ordinal α = .84]) and Secondary Psychopathy (10 items; e.g., “I find myself in the same kinds of trouble, time after time” [ordinal α = .78]). 2.2.4. Borderline personality features The Borderline Features Scale of the Personality Assessment Inventory (Morey, 1991) is a 24-item scale that captures four commonly agreed upon components of borderline personality functioning: affective instability, identity problems, negative relationships, and selfharm. Responses were made on scales that ranged from 0 (false, not at all true) to 3 (very true). This instrument has been shown to possess strong psychometric properties (Morey, 1991; Morey & Glutting, 1994), ordinal α = .89. 2.2.5. Theory of mind measures Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test. The RMET (Baron-Cohen, Wheelwright, & Hill, 2001) was used to assess the ability of participants
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Table 1 Intercorrelations and descriptive statistics for dark personality features and indicators of theory of mind. 1 1. Machiavellianism 2. PNI Grandiosity 3. PNI Vulnerability 4. LSRPS Primary Psychopathy 5. LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy 6. Borderline Personality Features 7. Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test 8. Situational Test of Emotion Management 9. Situational Test of Emotion Understanding 10. Hinting Task 11. Imposing Memory Test M SD
– .08⁎ .33⁎⁎⁎ .47⁎⁎⁎ .49⁎⁎⁎ .35⁎⁎⁎ −.09⁎⁎ −.32⁎⁎⁎ −.19⁎⁎⁎ −.11⁎⁎⁎ −.14⁎⁎⁎ 2.63 0.40
2 – .60⁎⁎⁎ .16⁎⁎ .14⁎⁎⁎ .24⁎⁎⁎ .00 .10⁎ −.05 .09⁎ −.03 3.25 0.70
3
– .36⁎⁎⁎ .47⁎⁎⁎ .59⁎⁎⁎ −.06 −.16⁎⁎⁎ −.15⁎⁎⁎ −.03 −.14⁎⁎⁎ 2.76 0.73
4
5
6
7
– .57⁎⁎⁎ .30⁎⁎⁎ −.31⁎⁎⁎ −.47⁎⁎⁎ −.40⁎⁎ −.21⁎⁎⁎ −.24⁎⁎⁎
– .58⁎⁎⁎ −.22⁎⁎⁎ −.39⁎⁎⁎ −.30⁎⁎⁎ −.10⁎⁎ −.20⁎⁎⁎
– −.05 −.14⁎⁎⁎ −.14⁎⁎⁎ −.08⁎ −.09⁎⁎
– .42⁎⁎⁎ .53⁎⁎⁎ .27⁎⁎⁎ .34⁎⁎⁎
2.06 0.42
2.06 0.47
1.19 0.44
24.32 4.53
8
9
10
11
– .62⁎⁎⁎ .22⁎⁎⁎ .39⁎⁎⁎ 2.23 0.43
– .30⁎⁎⁎ .48⁎⁎⁎ 0.54 0.17
– .21⁎⁎⁎ 7.78 1.55
– 2.77 0.43
Note. PNI = pathological narcissism inventory; and LSRPS = Levenson self-report psychopathy scale. ⁎p b .05; ⁎⁎p b .01; and ⁎⁎⁎p b .001.
to interpret the emotional expressions of adults using only images of their eye regions. The test consists of 36 photographic images of different individuals' eyes portraying different emotions. Participants were asked to make a forced-choice decision between four options as to which best described the state of mind of the individual in the photograph. Scores were calculated as the total number of correct responses with a maximum of 36 (range = 10–36). The Situational Test of Emotion Management (STEM; MacCann & Roberts, 2008) was developed to assess advanced emotional intelligence. Scores are relevant to the perception of others' emotions and indicates the ability to utilize such understanding to adjust one's own behavior. It includes 20 multiple-choice items in which participants select an action they would recommend for a character in a given scenario. Items are scored based on the adaptive value of the chosen response. For the present study, the internal consistency of this measure was ordinal α = .83. The Situational Test of Emotion Understanding (STEU; MacCann & Roberts, 2008) was developed to assess advanced emotional intelligence and focuses on the ability to read the emotions of others. The STEU contains 42 statements about work-related and personal scenarios. Participants were asked to indicate which of five emotions was most likely to have occurred in each scenario. Responses were scored from 0–4 based on the best-match to the situation. The internal consistency of this measure was ordinal α = .91 for the present study. The Hinting Task (Corcoran, Mercer, & Frith, 1995) was developed to assess the ability of participants to infer the intentions of speakers in ten, brief, indirect utterances that they read prior to answering the question, “What did the speaker intend to say?” The participant received a score of 1 for correct answers and a score of 0 for incorrect answers. Previous studies involving participants with mental disorders have sometimes provided clues if the first response was not correct (e.g., Corcoran et al., 1995) but we did not provide clues about the correct answer because our sample consisted of typical adults. Scores constituted the number of correct responses out of 10. The Imposing Memory Test was developed to assess an advanced form of theory of mind (Kinderman, Dunbar, & Bentall, 1998). It contains five short stories with a series of 20 true/false questions following each short story. The participants were asked to respond from memory and were scored regarding the accuracy of their response. Some of the questions asked about first- or second-order mental states of characters and were scored at a higher level for higher-order mental states. Scores on the questions were summed, ordinal α = .86. 3. Results Table 1 displays the correlations for the variables included in the present study along with their descriptive statistics. Table 2 displays the results of hierarchical multiple regression analyses in which each
measure of ToM was regressed onto the dark personality features. This regression approach is consistent with the approach that has been used most often with the Dark Triad because it identifies the distinctive and unique variance in each measure of ToM that is explained by each dark personality feature (Furnham, Richards, Rangel, & Jones, 2014). 1
3.1. RMET Machiavellianism was positively associated with performance (β = .08, t = 2.00, p = .05), whereas LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = −.29, t = − 7.31, p b .001) and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = − .15, t = − 3.25, p = .001) were negatively associated with performance on the RMET. It is important to note that Machiavellianism had a negative zero-order correlation with the RMET which is indicative of a suppressor effect.
3.2. STEM PNI Grandiosity was positively associated with performance on the STEM (β = .23, t = 5.72, p b .001), whereas Machiavellianism (β = − .08, t = − 2.02, p = .04), PNI Vulnerability (β = − .10, t = − 1.95, p = .05), LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = − .36, t = − 8.34, p b .001), and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = − .16, t = − 3.21, p = .001) were negatively associated with scores on the STEM.
3.3. STEU LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = − .35, t = − 8.87, p b .001), and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = −.13, t = −2.80, p = .005) were negatively associated with scores on the STEU.
3.4. Hinting task PNI Grandiosity (β = .15, t = 3.60, p b .001) was positively associated with performance on the Hinting Task, whereas LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = −.24, t = −5.67, p b .001) was negatively associated with performance on this measure. 1 Preliminary analyses included sex as a potential moderator of the associations that the dark personality features had with ToM. However, those analyses indicated only one significant interaction: PNI Vulnerability × sex for the analysis concerning the STEM (β = −.31, t = −2.39, p = .02). Simple slopes tests revealed that the association between PNI Vulnerability and the STEM was significant for men (β = −.33, t = −2.79, p = .01) but not for women (β = −.06, t = −0.91, p = .37). In the interest of parsimony, we did not include sex in the final analyses so it will not be discussed further.
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Table 2 Regression of the indicators of theory of mind onto the dark personality features.
Model Machiavellianism PNI Grandiosity PNI Vulnerability LSRPS Primary Psychopathy LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy Borderline Personality Features
Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test
Situational Test of Emotion Management
Situational Test of Emotion Understanding
Hinting Task
R2
R2
R2
R2
.11⁎⁎⁎
β .08⁎ .03 .02 −.29⁎⁎⁎ −.15⁎⁎⁎ .08
.29⁎⁎⁎
β −.08⁎ .23⁎⁎⁎ −.10⁎ −.36⁎⁎⁎ −.16⁎⁎⁎
β
.17⁎⁎⁎
R2
β
.07⁎⁎⁎ .01 .02 .01 −.35⁎⁎⁎ −.13⁎⁎
.08
Imposing Memory Test
.02
β
.07⁎⁎⁎ .02 .15⁎⁎⁎ −.01 −.24⁎⁎⁎ .07 −.07
−.00 .06 −.09 −.17⁎⁎⁎ −.10⁎ .06
Note. PNI = pathological narcissism inventory; and LSRPS = Levenson self-report psychopathy scale. ⁎p b .05; ⁎⁎p b .01; and ⁎⁎⁎p b .001.
3.5. Imposing memory test LSRPS Primary Psychopathy (β = − .17, t = − 4.22, p b .001) and LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy (β = − .10, t = − 2.15, p = .03) were both negatively associated with performance on the Imposing Memory Test.
4. Discussion The zero-order correlations revealed that the dark personality features – except for PNI Grandiosity – had reasonably consistent negative associations with the indicators of ToM. Certain dark personality features (e.g., LSRPS Primary and Secondary Psychopathy) were found to have unique negative associations with various aspects of ToM, whereas previous studies had revealed negative, positive, and no associations (Barlow et al., 2010; Dolan & Fullam, 2004; Dziobek et al., 2006; Preibler et al., 2010; Richell et al., 2003; Wastell & Booth, 2003). This suggests that the ToM deficits that characterize individuals with primary and secondary forms of psychopathy may be relatively broad in their scope. Previous studies had also found mixed results for Machiavellianism (Barlow et al., 2010; Wastell & Booth, 2003) but we found a unique positive association between Machiavellianism and the RMET in the present study, which is consistent with some previous findings (Esperger & Bereczkei, 2012). However, it should be noted that Machiavellianism displayed negative zero-order associations with ToM and that the positive associations with the RMET emerged in the regression model only after controlling for the overlap that Machiavellianism had with the other dark personality features. Callousness and manipulation may be at the core of the antagonistic dark personality features (Jones & Figueredo, 2013). Once this “core” is accounted for in these analyses, the remaining aspect of Machiavellianism (perhaps immorality and cynicism) has a positive association with the ability to read emotion states captured by the RMET. This may explain the inconsistent results that have emerged in previous studies that have examined the associations between Machiavellianism and indicators of ToM. PNI Grandiosity was positively associated with both emotional intelligence and ToM, which is also consistent with previous research (Vonk et al., 2013). These results support the idea that individuals high in PNI Grandiosity may benefit from a heightened ability to understand the mental states of others, which may allow them to be more effective at interpersonal manipulation. In contrast, primary and secondary psychopathy showed negative associations with both emotion understanding and emotion management, which may be indicative of a more general social cognitive deficit. Of the Vulnerable Dark Triad personality features, LSRPS Secondary Psychopathy was negatively associated with all measures except for the Hinting Task, whereas vulnerable narcissism was only modestly negatively associated with emotion management. Borderline personality
features were not associated with ToM. These findings are consistent with the results of some (e.g., Franzen et al., 2011; Schilling et al., 2012) but not all prior studies (e.g., Dziobek et al., 2011; Miller et al., 2010; Preibler et al., 2010; Vonk et al., 2013). The results from the present study reveal a pattern suggesting that antagonistic dark personality features (with the exception of grandiose narcissism) tend to have negative associations with certain aspects of ToM, whereas vulnerable dark personality features (with the exception of secondary psychopathy) do not. These results may help clarify previous contradictory findings regarding the relationship between dark personality features and the ability to understand and interpret the mental states of others. Some dark personality features (e.g., psychopathy) are associated with deficits in recognizing and reasoning about the mental states of others, whereas other dark personality features (e.g., grandiose narcissism) may be associated with ToM skills that would be beneficial for exploiting others, such as the ability to manage their own emotions. Individuals who are better able to both read the thoughts of others and control their own emotions display a combination of abilities that may be particularly advantageous when manipulating others. Although the present study had a number of strengths (e.g., large sample size, various dark personality features, multi-method assessment of ToM), a potential limitation was that the sample consisted of college students. As a result, we are unable to draw conclusions about the associations between dark personality features and ToM for individuals who meet diagnostic criteria for certain forms of psychopathology (e.g., narcissistic personality disorder). However, given that dark personality features vary substantially in nonclinical samples, examining the associations between dark personality features and various indicators of ToM in the present sample extends previous work in this area. It is also important to note that the present sample consisted predominantly of women, which may preclude generalizing these effects to men. Another potential limitation is that we were unable to determine whether there is a causal link between dark personality features and various components of ToM due to the correlational nature of the data. Thus, it is unclear whether specific ToM deficits contribute to the development of dark personality features or if there is another explanation for their associations such as neurological impairments. Future research should include an even broader array of dark personality features (e.g., greed, sadism, spitefulness). Our results suggest that future studies will be more informative if they attempt to tease apart specific personality traits and their associations with particular social cognitive impairments. Recent research has demonstrated the benefits of such a strategy when examining the associations that Dark Triad traits have with emotion deficiencies (Jonason & Krause, 2013) and social cognition (Sharp & Vanwoerden, 2014). Our study builds on these findings by including a broader array of dark personality features and ToM components. By adopting this strategy, we were able to determine whether individuals with elevated levels of particular dark personality features suffer from specific ToM deficits.
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