Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

The affective profiles model is based on the combination of individuals’ experience of high/low positive affect and high/low negative affect: self-fulfilling, high affective, low affective, and self-destructive. We used the profiles as the backdrop for the investigation of individual differences in malevolent character traits (i.e., the Dark Triad: psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism). A total of 1,000 participants (age: M = 31.50 SD = 10.27, 667 males and 333 females), recruited through Amazons’ Mechanical Turk (MTurk), responded to the Positive Affect Negative Affect Schedule and the Dark Triad Dirty Dozen. Individuals with a high affective profile reported higher degree of narcissism than those with any other profile, and together with individuals with a self-destructive profile, also higher degree of Machiavellianism and psychopathy than individuals with a low affective and self-fulfilling profile. Males scored higher in Machiavellianism and psychopathy. Together with earlier findings, our results show that while individuals in both the self-fulfilling and high affective profiles are extrovert and self-directed, only those in the high affective profile express an immature and malevolent character (i.e., high levels of all Dark Triad traits). Conversely, individuals in the self-fulfilling profile have earlier reported higher levels of cooperativeness and faith. More importantly, the unique association between high levels of positive emotions and narcissism and the unified association between negative emotions to both psychopathy and Machiavellianism imply a dyad rather than a triad of malevolent character traits.

Keywords

affective profiles model Dark Triad Machiavellianism narcissism negative affect personality positive affect psychopathy unification argument uniqueness argument

Positive and negative affect are easily seen as opposite ends of a single continuum (i.e., as being unidimensional). A unidimensional model, with well-being at one pole and ill-being at the other, however, presents qualitative differences between individuals who are high compared with low in both dimensions (Ito & Cacciopo, 1998). Indeed, there is extensive evidence that positive and negative affect are best thought as two independent dimensions of the affective system (for a review, see Garcia, 2011; cf. MacLeod & Moore, 2000). The Broaden-and-Build Theory (Fredrickson, 1998, 2006), for example, posits that the function of positive affect is related to approach-related behavior, which builds an individual’s resources for survival and well-being, while negative affect inhibits behavior that might lead to pain or punishment. Positive affect is a dimension that varies from pleasant engagement (e.g., enthusiastic and active) to unpleasant disengagement (e.g., sad and bored). The negative affect dimension, on the other hand, moves from unpleasant engagement (e.g., anger and fear) to pleasant disengagement (e.g., calm and serene; Watson & Clark, 1994; Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988). Nevertheless, there is evidence that rather than being completely independent, the two affectivity dimensions might be interrelated in a two-dimensional circumplex model containing not only arousal (vertical axis) but also a valence dimension (horizontal axis; Russell, 1980).

In the context of personality, positive and negative affect dimensions are strongly associated with extraversion and neuroticism, respectively. For example, individuals who score high on extraversion attend and react more intensely to positive stimuli than individuals with low levels of positive affect (i.e., introverts). In contrast, individuals who score high on neuroticism attend and react more intensely to negative stimuli than individuals with low levels of negative affect (i.e., emotionally stable individuals; Larsen & Ketelaar, 1991). However, sensitivity to negative stimuli is best predicted by measures of being a neurotic introvert (i.e., being high in harm avoidance or high in neuroticism and low in novelty seeking or low in extraversion), whereas sensitivity to positive stimuli is best predicted by being a stable extravert (i.e., being high in novelty seeking or high in extraversion and low in harm voidance or low in neuroticism; Corr, Kumari, Wilson, Checkley, & Gray, 1997; Corr et al., 1995). Hence, positive and negative affect represent general biobehavioral systems: positive affect is related to the Behavioral Activation System (BAS) or sensitivity to reward as well as approach motivation, while negative affect is related to the Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS) or sensitivity to signals of punishment as well as avoidance motivation (Gray, 1981; Watson, 2002; Watson, Wiese, Vaidya, & Tellegen, 1999).

Following this line of thinking, Archer and colleagues have developed four affective profiles: self-fulfilling (high positive affect, low negative affect), high affective (high positive affect, high negative affect), low affective (low positive affect, low negative affect), and self-destructive (low positive affect, high negative affect; see for example, Adrianson, Ancok, Ramdhani, & Archer, 2013; Archer, Adolfsson, & Karlsson, 2008; Archer, Adrianson, Plancak, & Karlsson, 2007; Bood, Archer, & Norlander, 2004; Norlander, Bood, & Archer, 2002; Norlander, Johansson, & Bood, 2005; Palomo, Beninger, Kostrzewa, & Archer, 2008; Palomo, Kostrzewa, Beninger, & Archer, 2007). A person with a self-fulfilling profile shows high self-acceptance, high autonomy, purpose in life, high energy, and internal locus of control (i.e., agency), positive relations with others, and helpful behavior (i.e., communion), and also seek support in faith (i.e., spirituality), while a person with a self-destructive profile experiences low levels in all these variables (e.g., Archer & Garcia, 2014, 2015; Garcia, Nima, & Kjell, 2014; Rapp Ricciardi et al., 2014; Schütz, Sailer, et al., 2013). These variables are all predictors of well-being or what Cloninger (2004, 2006, 2013) defines as feeling good (i.e., happiness), doing good (i.e., mature and actively virtuous living), physical health (i.e., absence of disease or infirmity), and prosperity (i.e., success, good fortune, and flourishing). As the affective profile model is person-centered (Garcia, 2015; Garcia, MacDonald, & Archer, 2015), it is possible to discern differences between profiles at the extreme ends of the model (i.e., self-destructive vs. self-fulfilling, low affective vs. high affective), but also within individuals that differ in one affectivity dimension and are similar in the other (i.e., self-destructive vs. high affective, self-destructive vs. low affective, low affective vs. self-fulfilling, and high affective vs. self-fulfilling). In other words, the affective profile model provides the advantage of studying multidimensional profiles of specific combinations of traits, because it allows the understanding of the experience in an individual who is “adapting within his or her biopsychosocial context” (Cloninger & Zohar, 2011, p. 25; see also Cloninger & Garcia, 2015; Garcia & Rosenberg, 2015).

More recently, researchers (e.g., Garcia, 2012; Garcia, Kerekes, Andersson-Arntén, & Archer, 2012; Garcia, Schütz, & Archer, 2015; Jimmefors et al., 2014) have focused on differences between profiles with regard to personality measures using models such as the Big Five model (Costa & McCrae, 1992) and Cloninger’s psychobiological model (Temperament and Character Inventory; Cloninger, Svrakic, & Przybeck, 1993). As hypothesized by these researchers, individuals with a self-fulfilling profile scored high in self-directedness, high in cooperativeness, high in persistence, high in extraversion, high in self-regulatory strategies defined as locomotion or a “just-do-it” mentality, and happiness-increasing strategies related to agency (e.g., frequently exercising, active leisure, goal-pursuit), communion (e.g., helping others, receiving help from others), and spirituality (e.g., seek support in faith). In contrast, individuals with a self-destructive profile scored high in reward dependence, high in neuroticism, high in self-regulatory strategies defined as assessment or inaction, and happiness-increasing strategies focused on suppression and rumination (e.g., suppression of negative thoughts, rumination of negative experiences). Moreover, individuals with a high affective profile were higher in reward dependence, higher in self-transcendence, higher in self-directedness, high in persistence, high in extraversion, and high in both locomotion and assessment. In contrast, individuals with a low affective profile were high in self-directedness, high in harm avoidance, and high in the self-regulatory strategy of assessment.

Taken together, these results suggest that individuals with a high positive affect profile (i.e., self-fulfilling and high affective) share certain personality features, but that individuals with a high affective profile also share features with individuals with a self-destructive profile. For example, individuals with a high affective profile are goal-directed, hard working, and agentic (i.e., high in self-directedness, high in persistence) as individuals with a self-fulfilling profile, but as individuals with a self-destructive profile they are also low in autonomy (i.e., one aspect of agency), pessimistic and tend to worry (i.e., high in neuroticism), are highly dependent on external appraisal (i.e., high in reward dependence), and ruminate about their ability to achieve goals (i.e., high in assessment). Other important differences between the individuals with a self-fulfilling and those with a high affective profile are, for example, that individuals with a high affective profile do not score high in helpful behavior, tolerance toward others, and empathy (i.e., communion and cooperative traits). Individuals with a self-fulfilling profile are, for instance, the only ones who report that they seek support in faith as one strategy in their own pursue of the happy life (Garcia, Schütz, & Archer, 2015; Schütz, Sailer, et al., 2013). However, individuals with a high affective profile score higher than individuals with low negative affect profiles (i.e., low affective and self-destructive) in self-transcendence (i.e., a spiritual trait partially defined as the ability to sense a unity with something bigger than the self; Cloninger, 2004; Garcia, 2012).

To expand the personality constructs that define each of the affective profiles, the present study aims to investigate differences between profiles in Dark Triad traits (i.e., psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism). The Dark Triad traits are, for instance, suggested to expand the Big Five personality model (Veselka, Scherme, & Vernon, 2012), that is, one of the personality models in which we have discerned differences between affective profiles. Thus, differences among profiles in their level of Dark Triad traits will also expand the current understanding of the affective profiles model. In addition, the affective profiles differ in personality traits using Cloninger’s psychobiological model, which is related to the Big Five model but yet a distinctive model of personality that measures character traits (Garcia, Anckarsäter, et al., 2015). To the best of our knowledge, Cloninger’s psychobiological model has not been used in conjunction with the Dark Triad. Hence, using the affective profiles model to map the Dark Triad traits in conjunction with earlier discerned personality differences among affective profiles in two different personality models might contribute to the debate of the Dark Triad as three distinctive traits (i.e., uniqueness argument; for example, Jones & Paulhus, 2011; Rauthmann & Kolar, 2013; Vernon, Villani, Vickers, & Harris, 2008) or as one global trait (i.e., unification argument; for example, Jonason, Li, & Teicher, 2010; Jonason, Li, Webster, & Schmitt, 2009; Jonason & Webster, 2010; Jones & Figueredo, 2013). Before discussing our expectations and the implications of these relationships in the context of Cloninger’s biopsychosocial model of personality, we briefly present the Dark Triad and how individuals’ Big Five personality traits are related to their malevolent traits.

The Dark Triad: Psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and Narcissism

Paulhus and Williams (2002) coined the term Dark Triad when they identified three clusters of personality traits at a subclinical level within the normal population: psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism. Psychopathy refers to high impulsivity, thrill-seeking, and low empathy and anxiety (Paulhus & Williams, 2002). The Machiavellian personality includes manipulative behaviors and deception for self-benefit (Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006). Individuals high in Machiavellianism are cynical, misanthropic, cold, pragmatic, and show immoral beliefs, and detached affect (Rauthmann & Will, 2011). Individuals high in narcissism show exaggeration of self-worth and importance, superiority over others, and are manipulative toward others yet they have a fragile sense of the self (Ames, Rose, & Anderson, 2006). They show vanity to an extreme, are constantly seeking attention, and harbor feelings of entitlement they do not deserve (Lee & Ashton, 2005). In other words, these traits are at the conceptual level different from each other (i.e., the uniqueness argument). Nevertheless, previous research has showed that the three traits have low to moderate correlations with one another (Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006; Lee & Ashton, 2005; Paulhus & Williams, 2002). Paulhus and Williams, for example, reported positive intercorrelations between narcissism and psychopathy, and between Machiavellianism and psychopathy. There was also a low intercorrelation between narcissism and Machiavellianism. Although these results have been replicated in some studies (e.g., Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006), they have not been replicated in others (e.g., Vernon et al., 2008). In addition, some studies report stronger correlations between the dark traits, while others report weaker correlations (e.g., Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006; Lee & Ashton, 2005; Paulhus & Williams, 2002; Vernon et al., 2008). Hence, there is a wide range of mixed results on how interrelated the dark traits actually are.

In line with the uniqueness argument, however, individuals high in narcissism stand apart by their high scores on self-enhancement (Furnham, Richards, & Paulhus, 2013; Jones & Paulhus, 2011). Self-enhancement, for instance, has been associated with extrinsic spiritual behavior (Sedikides & Gebauer, 2010), that is, spiritual behavior adopted as a means to an end (Allport & Ross, 1967). Individuals high in psychopathy, on the other hand, are different from individuals scoring high in the others Dark Triad traits because they also score high on impulsivity (Jones & Paulhus, 2011). Nevertheless, individuals high in levels of each of the Dark Triad traits share also high levels of agency and low levels of communion (Jones & Paulhus, 2011; Paulhus & Abild, 2011), which supports the unification argument.

Indeed, research on the Dark Triad shows these traits correlate with aggression, bullying, and racism, that is, antagonistic behaviors in interpersonal situations (i.e., low communion). High levels of psychopathy, for example, are positively related to direct (i.e., physical or verbal) and indirect aggression (i.e., gossiping, spreading rumors; Douglas, Bore, & Munro, 2012; Muris, Meester, & Timmermans, 2013), high levels of Machiavellianism are positively associated with both forms of aggression but more strongly to indirect aggression, and narcissism is positively linked to direct forms of aggression (Kerig & Stellwagen, 2010; Lau & Marsee, 2013). With regard to bullying, psychopathy is the one dark trait most strongly related to bullying, followed by Machiavellianism and narcissism (Baughman, Dearing, Giammarco, & Vernon, 2012). It is important to point out that bully/victims score significantly higher than non-bully/non-victims on psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism (Linton & Power, 2013). The Dark triad is positively correlated with out-group threat perceptions, anti-immigrant prejudice (Hodson, Hogg, & McInnes, 2009), and different forms of racism (Jones, 2013). High levels of Machiavellianism predict modern racism (i.e., specific types of inequality rather than negative responses to minorities in general), whereas high levels of psychopathy predict old-fashioned racism (embedded in opposition of any form of racial equality). In sum, the three dark traits seem to share a non-cooperative core, but with different nuances of non-cooperative behavior. This suggests a one global trait structure (i.e., unification argument) rather than a ternary structure (i.e., uniqueness argument). In this context, researchers have turned to one of the most common and reliable model of personality, the Big Five, to discern differences and similarities between individuals who express these malevolent traits.

A Dyad of Personality Models: The Dark Triad and the Big Five Model

As it could be expected, individuals who score high in any of the three Dark Triad traits score low in agreeableness as well. Individuals who score high in psychopathy and narcissism score also high on extraversion and openness. Those high in Machiavellianism and psychopathy score low in conscientiousness, while individuals high in psychopathy also score low in neuroticism (Paulhus & Williams, 2002). As with the relationships within the triad, relationships between the triad and the Big Five traits have been replicated in some studies (Lee & Ashton, 2005) but not in others (Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006). Yet other studies report correlations between each of the Dark Triad traits and several of the Big Five traits, for example, high psychopathy with low agreeableness and low conscientiousness, and high narcissism with high extraversion, high openness, and low agreeableness (Vernon et al., 2008). Thus, even if there are some correlations between the Dark Triad and the Big Five, these are neither large nor consistent and this indicates that the two models represent overlapping but distinct clusters of personality (Vernon et al., 2008).

The most consistent finding is that individuals who express high levels in any of the Dark Triad traits also score low in agreeableness (Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006; Jonason & Webster, 2010; Lee & Ashton, 2005; Paulhus & Williams, 2002). Importantly, agreeableness is positively related to the character trait of cooperativeness in Cloninger’s model (De Fruyt, Van De Wiele, & Van Heeringen, 2000, 2006, Garcia, 2012; Garcia, Anckarsäter, et al., 2015). For instance, while the Dark Triad as one global construct (i.e., the sum of all three traits) is related to low levels of agreeableness, high levels of extraversion, high levels of openness, low levels of neuroticism, and low levels of conscientiousness, the only common correlate for each unique dark trait is low levels of agreeableness (Jonason et al., 2010). This does, as discussed earlier, suggest a common uncooperative core for the three dark traits (i.e., unification argument).

Individuals who are agreeable are described as interested in social harmony, whereas those who are disagreeable are described as antisocial, autocratic, selfish, stubborn, demanding, headstrong, impatient, intolerant, outspoken, hard-hearted, argumentative, and aggressive (cf. low cooperativeness; Cloninger, 2004). Hence, it is clear why individuals with high levels in any of the dark traits always score lowest in agreeableness and are less likely to help other people (Furnham et al., 2013; Jonason, Li, & Buss, 2010; Lannin, Guyll, Krizan, Madon, & Cornish, 2014; Veselka et al., 2012; White, 2014). Agreeableness is, indeed, considered as the core trait contributing to prosocial behavior (Aghababaei, Wasserman, & Nannini, 2014; Carlo, Okun, Knight, & de Guzman, 2005; Lee & Ashton, 2005). However, although a person high in the Dark Triad traits is predominantly disagreeable, she or he is also low in conscientiousness, stable, and extravert (Furnham, Richard, Rangel, & Jones, 2014).

The Present Study

The aim of this study was to investigate differences between affective profiles in the Dark Triad traits. To the best of our knowledge, no other studies have investigated these differences. We expect this to expand the research on differences in personality between affective profiles because the Dark Triad traits are suggested to expand the Big Five personality model (Veselka et al., 2012), which is one of the personality models already studied using the affective profiles model. Research on the Dark Triad has a fairly detailed picture of which of the Big Five personality traits help to discern diferences (i.e., uniqueness argument) and commonalities (i.e., unification argument) among the Dark Triad traits. This is, however, not the case for Cloninger’s model of personality, which has already been used to discern differences in personality between affective profiles. Hence, using the affective profiles model as the framework for differences in malevolent tendencies, in conjunction with earlier discerned personality differences among profiles, might contribute to the debate of the Dark Triad as one global trait (i.e., unification argument) or three distinctive traits (i.e., uniqueness argument).

In the context of affectivity, psychopathy seems to be associated with high levels of negative affect (Love & Holder, 2014), which is a marker for neuroticism and harm avoidance. In contrast, psychopathy is associated with low levels of positive affect (Love & Holder, 2014), which is a marker for low levels of extraversion and self-directedness. Thus, suggesting that individuals with a self-destructive profile (low positive affect/high negative affect) can be expected to be high in psychopathy. In this line, individuals with a self-fulfilling profile (high positive affect, low negative affect) have been depicted as more cooperative and tolerant to others, more stable, and conscious, whereas individuals with a high negative affect profile (i.e., high affective and self-destructive) are depicted as less agreeable (Garcia, 2012; Garcia et al., 2014). These earlier findings suggest that individuals with a high affective or a self-destructive profile should score higher in the Dark Triad traits. Nevertheless, one obvious difference between individuals with a high affective and those with a self-destructive profile is that individuals with a high affective profile experience high positive affect, which is positively related to extraversion (see, for example, Garcia’s [2012] study, in which individuals with a high affective profile score higher in extraversion compared with individuals with a self-destructive profile). Extraversion is, for instance, positively related to narcissism (e.g., Paulhus & Williams, 2002; Vernon et al., 2008). Therefore, we expected individuals with a high affective and a self-destructive profile to be higher in both psychopathy and Machiavellianism compared with individuals with a self-fulfilling or a low affective profile, but this two high negative affect profiles (i.e., self-destructive and high affective) were expected to differ in narcissism—the individuals with a high affective profile being the ones expected to score higher in narcissism.

Method

Ethics Statement

The review board of the Network for Empowerment and Well-Being approved the research protocol, which was found to comply with the law concerning research involving humans and requiring only informed consent from the participants. Participants, workers from the crowdsourcing platform Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (MTurk), provided their consent by simply accepting the task (or HIT as it is called in MTurk) and then answering the survey. This acceptance is recorded electronically together with the participants’ answers.

Participants and Procedure

The participants (N = 1,000, age M = 31.50 SD. = 10.27; 667 males and 333 females) were recruited through MTurk (https://www.mturk.com/mturk/welcome). MTurk allows data collectors to recruit participants (workers) online for completing different tasks in exchange for wages. This method for data collection online has become more common during recent years and it is an empirical tested valid tool for conducting research in the social sciences (see Buhrmester, Kwang, & Gosling, 2011). Participants were recruited by the following criteria: being U.S. resident and being able to speak and read fluent in English. Participants were paid a wage of .20 cents of American dollars for completing the task and informed that the study was anonymous and voluntary. The participants were presented with a battery of self-reports comprising the affect and Dark Triad measures, as well as demographic questions (e.g., age, sex). We included two validity check items to control for random responding (“In this question, please answer either agree or disagree”). A total of 52 individuals out of 1,052 (i.e., 5.20%) were dropped from the final analysis because they answered erroneously to one or both validity check items.

Instruments

Positive Affect and Negative Affect Schedule

The instrument (Watson et al., 1988) instructs participants to rate to what extent they generally have experienced 20 different feelings or emotions (10 positive affect and 10 negative affect) during the last weeks, using a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = very slightly, 5 = extremely). The 10-item positive affect scale includes adjectives such as strong, proud, and interested. The 10-item negative affect scale includes adjectives such as afraid, ashamed, and nervous. We averaged together the responses to each item to create an index of each scale.

The Dark Triad Dirty Dozen

The instrument (Jonason & Webster, 2010) is composed of 12 items (Likert-type scale: 1 = not at all; 7 = very much), four for each Dark Triad trait: psychopathy (e.g., “I tend to lack remorse”), Machiavellianism (e.g., “I have used deceit or lied to get my way”), and narcissism (e.g., “I tend to want others to admire me”). We averaged together the responses to each item to create an index of each trait.

Statistical Treatment

Participants’ positive and negative affect scores were divided into high and low using the median as reference and then combined to create the four affective profiles (cutoff points in the present study: high positive affect = 3.20 or above; low positive affect = 3.10 or less, or above; high negative affect = 1.90 or above; low negative affect = 1.80 or less). This resulted in 281 individuals with a self-fulfilling profile, 216 with a low affective profile, 198 with a high affective profile, and 305 individuals with a self-destructive profile. The distribution of the participants over the profiles showed that the number of individuals in the low affective and high affective profiles were about the same. Similarly, about the same number of participants was allocated to the self-destructive and self-fulfilling profiles (see Table 1). A Shapiro–Wilkes test for normality showed that the affective profiles scores on the Dark Triad, except for high affective individual’s scores on Machiavellianism, deviated from the normal distribution. Nevertheless, the Central Limit Theorem suggests that, with sufficiently large sample sizes, it is plausible to assume that sampling distributions of means are normally distributed regardless of the distributions of the variables (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2007). Moreover, there were no significant results on Levene’s test for homogeneity of variance with the profiles as the independent variable.

Table 1.

Sex Distribution Among Affective Profiles.

Affective profile	Male % (n)	Female % (n)	Total % (n)
Self-destructive	25.3 (169)	40.8 (136)	30.5 (305)
Low affective	22.2 (148)	20.4 (68)	21.6 (216)
High affective	20.7 (138)	18.0 (60)	19.8 (198)
Self-fulfilling	31.8 (212)	20.8 (69)	28.1 (281)

Note. χ²(3) = 28.3, p = .001.

To check for the validity of the profiling of the participants, we contacted an independent researcher who has worked with k-means analyses as the method for the person-oriented approach on individual differences. Our data were submitted to this analysis. Specifically, Ward’s hierarchical cluster analysis was used to divide the sample into four groups, and k-means cluster analysis used the starting points from this analysis to investigate whether individuals actually ended up in a group most similar to their affective profile. The weighed mean of clusters homogeneity coefficient was .73. Suggesting a good model fit and that the participants in the present study were categorized in four profiles using their combination of self-reported affect (S. MacDonald, personal communication on January the 2nd, 2015). Part of the data in the present study was used in a study in which we address methodological questions regarding the median split and cluster approaches (see Garcia, MacDonald, & Archer, 2015).

Results

Pearson correlations between psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism were positive and significant showing moderate correlations for Machiavellianism and psychopathy (r = .49, df = 998, p < .001) and Machiavellianism and narcissism (r = .43, df = 998, p < .001) but a less strong relation between psychopathy and narcissism (r = .21, df = 998, p < .001). Negative affect was positively and significantly related to psychopathy (r = .15, df = 998, p < .001), Machiavellianism (r = .20, df = 998, p < .001), and narcissism (r = .20, df = 998, p < .001). Positive affect was positively and significantly related to narcissism (r = .12, df = 998, p < .01) and negatively correlated to psychopathy (r = −.10, df = 998, p < .01). All relations between affect and the Dark Triad traits were, however, weak (see Ferguson, 2009, who recommends r = .20 as minimum effect size representing a practically significant effect for social science data). Table 2 shows the correlations, means and standard deviations (SD), and Cronbach’s α for all variables in the present study.

Table 2.

Correlations, Means and Standard Deviations (SD), and Cronbach’s Alpha (in Diagonal Dark Cells) for All Variables in the Present Study.

	M	SD	1	2	3	4	5	6
1. Psychopathy	2.74	1.28	.76
2. Machiavellianism	3.37	1.35	.49***	.78
3. Narcissism	3.82	1.33	.21***	.43***	.77
4. Positive affect	3.08	0.74	−.10***	.01	.12***	.86
5. Negative affect	2.00	0.75	.15***	.20***	.20***	−.21***	.88
6. Sex	N/A	N/A	−.19***	−.07**	−.06**	−.12***	.12***	N/A

Note. N/A = not applicable.

p < .01. ***p < .001.

A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was calculated with affective profiles and sex as the independent variables and the Dark Triad traits as the dependent variables. Table 3 shows the means and standard deviations (±) for the different profiles and across sex. There was a significant main effect of the affective profiles on the Dark Triad traits, F(9, 2409.55) = 6.45, p = .001, Wilks’s λ = .94, η² = .02. The profiles differed in psychopathy, F(3, 992) = 5.78, p = .001, η² = .02. A post hoc test using Bonferroni correction to the alpha level showed that individuals with a self-destructive (M = 2.86, SD = 1.25) and a high affective (M = 2.90, SD = 1.37) profile scored higher on psychopathy compared with individuals with a self-fulfilling profile (M = 2.49, SD = 1.20). The affective profiles differed in Machiavellianism as well, F(3, 992) = 10.18, p = .001, η² = .03. A post hoc test using Bonferroni correction to the alpha level showed that individuals with a high affective profile (M = 3.68, SD = 1.35) and individuals with a self-destructive profile (M = 3.54, SD = 1.30) scored higher on Machiavellianism compared with individuals with a low affective profile (M = 3.14, SD = 0.97) and individuals with a self-fulfilling profile (M = 3.15, SD = 1.34). Furthermore, the profiles also differed in narcissism, F(3, 992) = 12.26, p = .001, η² = .04. A post hoc test using Bonferroni correction to the alpha level showed that individuals with a high affective profile (M = 4.25, SD = 1.27) scored higher on narcissism compared with individuals with a self-destructive profile (M = 3.88, SD = 1.26) and individuals with a self-fulfilling profile (M = 3.77, SD = 1.38). Individuals with a low affective profile scored lower on narcissism (M = 3.43, SD = 1.29) compared with all profiles but the self-fulfilling. For a summary of the differences, see also Figure 1.

Table 3.

Means and Standard Deviations (SD = ±) in Dark Triad Traits Among Affective Profiles and Sex.

	Self-destructive	Low affective	High affective	Self-fulfilling	Sex
	Self-destructive	Low affective	High affective	Self-fulfilling	Male	Female
Psychopathy	2.86 ± 1.25^F	2.74 ± 1.31	2.90 ± 1.37^F	2.49 ± 1.20	2.91 ± 1.31^♂	2.39 ± 1.15
Machiavellianism	3.54 ± 1.30^{F, L}	3.13 ± 1.35	3.68 ± 1.35^{F, L}	3.15 ± 1.34	3.44 ± 1.36^♂	3.24 ± 1.32
Narcissism	3.88 ± 1.26^L	3.42 ± 1.29	4.24 ± 1.27^{F, L, D}	3.77 ± 1.38	3.88 ± 1.33	3.71 ± 1.32

Note. F = higher when compared with individuals with a self-fulfilling profile; L = higher when compared with individuals with a low affective profile; D = higher when compared with individuals with a self-destructive profile; ♂ = higher than females.

All significant at p < .01.

Figure 1.

Differences found between individuals with affective profiles that are at their extremes: self-destructive versus self-fulfilling (low-high positive affect, high-low negative affect) and low affective versus high affective (low-high positive affect, low-high negative affect). Differences found when individuals were matched in one affective dimension, and differed in the other (i.e., within differences): self-destructive versus high affective (matching: high-high negative affect, differing: low-high positive affect), self-destructive versus low affective (matching: low-low positive affect, differing: high-low negative affect), high affective versus self-fulfilling (matching: high-high positive affect, differing: high-low negative affect), and low affective versus self-fulfilling (matching: low-low negative affect, differing: low-high positive affect).

There was a main effect of sex on Dark Triad traits, F(3, 990) = 14.11, p = .001, Wilks’s λ = .96, η² = .04. Males (M = 2.91, SD = 1.31) scored higher in psychopathy, F(1, 992) = 41.12, p = .001, η² = .04, compared with women (M = 2.39, SD = 1.15). Males (M = 3.44, SD = 1.36) scored also slightly higher in Machiavellianism, F(1, 992) = 6.19, p = .013 η² = .006, compared with females (M = 3.24, SD = 1.32). There were no significant mean differences between the sexes with regard to narcissism (men: M = 3.88, SD = 1.33; women: M = 3.71, SD = 1.32). There were no significant interaction effects between affective profiles and sex.

Discussion

The research on affective profiles has a 10-year long history, while the number of studies on the Dark Triad has increased fast during the last years. To expand earlier findings that show differences in personality traits between individuals with different affective profiles, were we interested in differences between profiles in the Dark Triad traits. The Dark Triad traits show, for instance, significant phenotypic, genetic, and environmental correlations to measures of personality traits that are distinct to those measured in the Big Five model (Veselka et al., 2012), thus, making these dark traits non-explored territory in the context of the affective profiles model. Moreover, if individuals with different affective profiles varied in their Dark Triad traits, this was expected to shed some light into the debate of unification versus uniqueness of these malevolent traits. After all, individuals with different affective profiles have shown variance in personality traits commonly (i.e., the Big Five model) and non-earlier (i.e., Cloninger’s psychobiological model) used to investigate associations to the dark trait. The most important findings were that (a) individuals with a high affective profile reported higher degree of narcissism than individuals with any of the other profiles, and they also reported higher levels of Machiavellianism and psychopathy than individuals with a low affective or a self-fulfilling profile and that (b) individuals with a self-destructive profile also were higher on Machiavellianism and psychopathy compared with individuals with a low affective or a self-fulfilling profile. For a summary of the differences in the present study, see Figure 1.

Earlier findings show that individuals with a self-fulfilling or a high affective profile share high levels of agentic traits, such as self-directedness (i.e., goal-directedness, self-acceptance, etcetera) and persistence (i.e., a personality trait describing an individual who is perfectionist and hard working; see among others Garcia, 2012; Garcia et al., 2012). The present results, however, show that despite the fact that individuals with any of these two profiles might be defined as high in agentic traits, individuals with a self-fulfilling profile scored lower in the Dark Triad traits, while individuals with a high affective profile scored high in these malevolent traits. That is, high levels in the malevolent triad are associated with positive affect when negative affect is high (see Figure 1). In this context, earlier results show that, compared with the other profiles, including the high affective, the self-fulfilling scores the highest in communal traits (i.e., cooperativeness); traits that comprise tolerance toward others and empathic and helpful behavior (Garcia, 2012; see Figure 2). Accordingly, individuals who score high in levels of each of the Dark Triad traits share also high levels of agency and low levels of communion (Jones & Paulhus, 2011; Paulhus & Abild, 2011).

Figure 2.

Summary of the personality trait differences between affective profiles in the present and other studies (e.g., Garcia, 2012; Garcia, Kerekes, Andersson-Arntén, & Archer, 2012).

Nevertheless, others have suggested that it is not correct to dismiss the Dark Triad as simply low in communal traits (e.g., agreeableness, cooperativeness)—a person high in the Dark Triad traits is predominantly disagreeable, but also an extravert (Furnham et al., 2014). Indeed, individuals with a high affective profile, compared with those with a low positive affect profile (i.e., low affective and self-destructive), are high in extraversion (Garcia, 2012; see Figure 2). Nevertheless, individuals with a high affective profile have been found to be high in neuroticism, as those with a self-destructive profile, but low in harm avoidance, as those individuals with a self-fulfilling profile. In other words, all these three profiles (i.e., high affective, low affective, and self-destructive; see Figure 2) are rather emotionally unstable compared with the self-fulfilling profile (Garcia, 2012). However, individuals with a high affective profile show, at the same time, a tendency to be fearless, carefree, courageous, energetic, outgoing, and optimistic even in situations that worry most people (i.e., low harm avoidance). Psychopathy is, indeed, negatively associated with harm avoidance (Fowles & Dindo, 2006). In other words, individuals with a high affective profile seem to be high in agentic traits (i.e., self-directedness, persistence, extraversion), low in communal traits (i.e., cooperativeness, agreeableness), high in the dark traits (i.e., psychopathy, Machiavellianism, narcissism), and low in harm avoidance, but high in neuroticism. In contrast, individuals with a self-destructive profile are low in agentic traits, low in communal traits, and high in dark traits, but high in both harm avoidance and neuroticism (see Figure 2).

Nevertheless, our finding linking psychopathy to the self-destructive profile, a profile in turn linked to high neurotic and high in harm avoidant behavior, is at first sight counterintuitive. Psychopathy has after all been found to correlate negatively to neuroticism (e.g., Paulhus & Williams, 2002) and negative affect (Love & Holder, 2014), which is almost synonymous with neuroticism (e.g., Tellegen, 1993; Watson et al., 1988). Nevertheless, some studies have not replicated the link high psychopathy-low neuroticism (Veselka et al., 2012). The findings presented here, however, suggest that both high and low neuroticism (emotional stability being the opposite end of neuroticism) might be found in individuals high in psychopathy, hence suggesting the probability of both a emotionally stable (tentatively high in affectivity: high affective) and a emotionally instable psychopath (tentatively low in positive affect and high in negative affect: self-destructive). Importantly, psychopathy was only higher when profiles at one extreme end of the model where compared (i.e., self-destructive vs. self-fulfilling, see Figure 1) or within profiles high in positive affect that vary in negative affect (high affective vs. self-fulfilling, see Figure 1). Hence, psychopathy does not seem to be higher within profiles low in positive affect that vary in their negative affect levels (self-destructive vs. low affective, see Figure 1), within profiles with high negative affect that vary in their positive affect levels (self-destructive vs. high affective, Figure 1), or within profiles with low negative affect that vary in their positive affect levels (low affective vs. self-fulfilling, Figure 1). Furthermore, Machiavellianism differed between profiles at both extreme ends of the model (high affective vs. low affective and self-destructive vs. self-fulfilling, Figure 1), but also within profiles low in positive affect that vary in their levels of negative affect (self-destructive vs. low affective, see Figure 1) and within profiles high in positive affect that vary in their levels of negative affect (high affective vs. self-fulfilling, see Figure 1).

Moreover, individuals with a high affective profile scored higher in narcissism compared with all profiles, even compared with individuals with a self-destructive profile. This was expected because individuals with a high affective profile score higher in extraversion compared with individuals with a self-destructive profile—extraversion is after all positively related to narcissism (e.g., Paulhus & Williams, 2002; Vernon et al., 2008). The matched comparisons, however, suggest a complex picture for narcissism. This dark trait differed between individuals at one extreme end of the affective profile model (low affective vs. high affective), but also within profiles that were high in negative affect and varied in their levels of positive affect (self-destructive vs. high affective, see Figure 1), within profiles that were low in positive affect and varied in their levels of negative affect (self-destructive vs. low affective, see Figure 1), and within profiles that were high in positive affect and varied in their levels of negative affect (high affective vs. self-fulfilling, see Figure 1). Moreover, in relation to earlier research, individuals high in narcissism stand apart by being high in self-enhancement (Furnham et al., 2013; Jones & Paulhus, 2011), which is in turn associated with extrinsic spiritual behavior (Sedikides & Gebauer, 2010). Extrinsic spiritual behavior is adopted as a means to an end (Allport & Ross, 1967). In this context, individuals with a high affective profile score high in spiritual traits (i.e., self-transcendence) compared with individuals with a low affective and self-destructive profile (Garcia, 2012; see Figure 2). Nevertheless, only individuals with a self-fulfilling profile report seeking support in faith (Schütz, Sailer, et al., 2013). We argue that this suggests that individuals with a high affective profile have a more means to an end approach to their spirituality/self-transcendence. The high affective profile is for instance depicted using Cloninger’s model of personality, as high in self-directedness, low in cooperativeness, and high in self-transcendence (Garcia, 2012; Garcia et al., 2012). Cloninger labels this specific character combination as “fanatical” (e.g., Cloninger & Zohar, 2011). Individuals with this character combination are prone to depression but also paranoid (Cloninger, 2004; Josefsson, Merjonen, Jokela, Pulkki-Råback, & Keltikangas-Järvinen, 2011). That is, our findings suggest that narcissism should be associated with these types of disorders. Nevertheless, this is a question for future research that should include measures of character and the Dark Triad traits along the affective profile model.

Finally, we found that men scored higher in psychopathy and slightly higher in Machiavellianism compared with women. This is accordingly to earlier research showing that men score higher than women in all three Dark Triad traits (Jonason et al., 2010; Jonason et al., 2009; Jonason & Webster, 2010). However, narcissism did not differed between men and women in the present study and the differences in Machiavellianism were rather small. This is, nonetheless, also in line with other studies (Jones & Paulhus, 2014; Paulhus & Williams, 2002). Our results also replicated those findings suggesting positive correlations between Machiavellianism and psychopathy (Paulhus & Williams, 2002) and correlations between Machiavellianism and narcissism (Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006). This last finding is, however, contradictory to that from other studies (e.g., Paulhus & Williams, 2002).

Limitations and Strengths of the Present Study

It is plausible to point out some potential issues with the choice of using MTurk to gather the data: for example, workers’ attention levels, cross-talk between participants, and the fact that participants get remuneration for their answers (Buhrmester et al., 2011). Nevertheless, a large quantity of studies show that data on personality scales collected through MTurk meet academic standards and it is demographically diverse (Buhrmester et al., 2011; Horton, Rand, & Zeckhauser, 2011; Paolacci, Chandler, & Ipeirotis, 2010). Moreover, data on health measures collected through MTurk show satisfactory internal as well as test–retest reliability (Shapiro, Chandler, & Mueller, 2013). In addition, the amount of payment does not seem to affect data quality, remuneration is usually small, and workers report being intrinsically motivated (e.g., for enjoyment) to take part in surveys (Buhrmester et al., 2011).

With regard to the Dark Triad measure used here (i.e., Dark Triad Dirty Dozen; Jonason & Webster, 2010), it is important to point out that while some researchers find it as an appropriate measure of these malevolent traits, others have criticized its validity (e.g., Lee et al., 2012; Miller & Lynam, 2012; Paulhus & Jones, 2014). For sake of brevity Jonason and Webster’s (2010) Dirty Dozen only comprises 12 items (four for each trait), while other measures, such as, Jones and Paulhus’ (2014) the Short Dark Triad comprises 27 items (seven for each trait). For instance, the Dark Triad Dirty Dozen has demonstrated less predictive power (e.g., Jones & Paulhus, 2014; Lee et al., 2012) compared with the measure developed by Jones and Paulhus (2014; the Short Dark Triad). In addition, although we opted to use a 7-point Likert-type scale, as in Jonason and Luévano’s (2013) study, some studies have used a 5-point Likert-type scale (e.g., Jonason, Li, & Czarna, 2013; Jonason, Slomski, & Partyka, 2012) or a 9-point Likert-type scale (e.g., Jonason & Webster, 2010). Hence, it is difficult to compare samples and our findings need to be replicated using more reliable measures of the Dark Triad.

Finally, the allocation of the participants to different profiles using median splits has some methodological problems (Garcia, MacDonald, & Archer, 2015). For instance, median splits distort the meaning of high and low because scores just-above and just-below the median become high and low by fiat, not by reality (Garcia, MacDonald, & Archer, 2015; Schütz, Archer, & Garcia, 2013). To avoid this problem, some studies have used larger samples as reference to create the profiles of smaller samples (e.g., Rapp Ricciardi et al., 2014), others have opted to use the cutoff points found in the original study (i.e., Norlander et al., 2002), and yet others have used aged-based cutoff points (e.g., Garcia, 2011). Nevertheless, using more sophisticated approaches (e.g., k-means cluster analysis) to allocate individuals in profiles, based on self-reported affect, also arrives to a four profiles solution as theorized by Archer (e.g., Garcia, MacDonald, & Archer, 2015; MacDonald & Kormi-Nouri, 2013). This was also the case for the sample used here. To the best of our knowledge, no study has established which of the methods (median split vs. cluster analysis) construe the profiles more statistically accurate or has analyzed whether there are differences in the results depending on the approach being used. Importantly, the categorization is based on the theoretical framework of the affective system as being composed of independent dimensions. Hence, the affective profiles model goes beyond the view of affect as two separate systems and takes into account the interaction of both dispositions and also observations of two-system theories suggesting that, when using dichotomous features, combinations must be ruled out (for a point of view on two-system theories, see Garcia, 2011; Keren & Schul, 2009). In other words, while there are differences between individuals in positive and/or negative affect, these two components of the affective system exist within each individual. On the basis of this independent coexistence of self-regulation (i.e., approach behavior vs. avoidance behavior), it is plausible to assume that there exist differences within the individual as well—some experiencing high positive affect but low negative affect or any combination in-between.

Our findings using the affective profile model suggest that the description of an individual high in the Dark Triad traits is complex and that, as suggested by Furnham and colleagues (2013), studies comparing the dark traits with other personality traits might need to investigate differences at the subscale level. For instance, individuals with a high affective profile have scored lower than individuals with a self-fulfilling profile in the agentic trait of autonomy (Garcia et al., 2014). In other words, although both the self-fulfilling and the high affective are high in agentic traits, such as, self-directedness they might differ in aspects of self-directedness describing self-discipline and self-control, which are negatively associated with the Dark Triad traits (Jonason & Tost, 2010).

Conclusion and Final Remarks

In sum, the affective profiles model allows the comparison between individuals taking into account the different combinations of individuals’ affective experience. The strength of the model is that comparisons take into consideration that individuals can be diametrically different (low affective vs. high affective and self-destructive vs. self-fulfilling) or equal in one aspect of their affective experience and at the same time different in the other (i.e., high affective vs. self-fulfilling, low affective vs. self-fulfilling, self-destructive vs. low affective, and self-destructive vs. high affective; see Figure 1). In light of the results presented here, some suggestions and predictions are warranted in regard to the unification versus uniqueness Dark Triad traits’ debate. First, we suggest that narcissism is uniquely different from the other three dark traits because it is the only dark trait to be associated with high positive affect when negative affectivity is high (self-destructive vs. high affective). A direct translation of the findings to other models of personality could be that, while narcissism shares low levels of agreeable and cooperative behavior with the other dark traits, narcissism is positively related to extrovert behavior (e.g., high positive affect, socializing) only when the individual is also high in neurotic behavior (e.g., high negative affect, emotionally unstable). This is accordingly to the description of a narcissistic personality as involving a grandiose yet fragile sense of the self (Ames et al., 2006).

At a first look, psychopathy and Machiavellianism seem to mostly be associated with negative affect, both the high affective and self-destructed profiles scored high in these malevolent traits. However, Machiavellianism was associated with high levels of negative affect when positive affect was high (high affective vs. self-fulfilling, Figure 1) and low (self-destructive vs. low affective, Figure 1) or when profiles at both extreme ends of the model were compared. Psychopathy on the other hand was associated with high negative affect only in two instances: when profiles at one extreme end of the model were compared (self-destructive vs. self-fulfilling) and when positive affect was high (high affective vs. self-fulfilling, Figure 1). In other words, while Machiavellianism is generally associated with high levels of negative affect, psychopathy has a unique association with high negative affect only when positive affect is high at the same time. This also suggests that psychopathy should be positively related to extrovert behavior (e.g., high positive affect, socializing) only when the individual is high in neurotic behavior (e.g., high negative affect, emotional stable). But psychopathy should also be positively related to the opposite of extrovert behavior, that is, introvert behavior (e.g., low positive affect, being reserved and a loner), under the same premises (i.e., high in neurotic behavior). At the end, however, psychopathy and Machiavellianism seem to have more similarities than differences, at least when it comes to affectivity (see Figure 1). Thus, our study suggests that there are two unique traits in the triad, narcissism being one of them, because it is uniquely associated with positive affect when negative affect is high. The other is probably a global antisocial trait composed of psychopathy and Machiavellianism that is related to negative affect in general.

Our results suggest that individuals who score high in the Dark Triad traits might have lesser of the attributes linked to the self-fulfilling profile: agency (i.e., self-acceptance, autonomy, goal-directedness), communion (i.e., cooperation, helpfulness, empathy), and intrinsic spirituality (i.e., seeking support from faith). These attributes together form a creative character and are all necessary for well-being or what Cloninger (2004, 2006, 2013) defines as feeling good (i.e., happiness), doing good (i.e., mature and actively virtuous living), physical health (i.e., absence of disease or infirmity), and prosperity (i.e., success, good fortune, and flourishing) (see also Falhgren, Nima, Archer, & Garcia, 2015). In contrast to individuals with a high affective profile and who are also high in some agentic and some spiritual traits, individuals with a self-fulfilling profile are not self-centered, manipulative, or malevolent. For instance, self-fulfilling individuals with a creative character, such as, Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King (Cloninger, 2004), have imposed important changes for humanity using, for example, civil disobedience (Thoreau, 2009). This behavior has led their oppressors to see them as villains. The difference between a hero and a villain might be that the hero pursue communal values in an agentic and spiritual manner, while the villain is all about agency and manipulation of communal and spiritual values (for recent research on the difference between agentic/communal values and agentic/communal traits showing important effects on happiness, see Abele, 2014).

In the end, my kingdom was united not by a hero or a villain, as legend had predicted, but by one who was both hero and villain. And her name was Maleficent. (From the movie Maleficent, 2014)

Footnotes

We would like to thank Dr. Shane Macdonald for his advice on k-mean analysis. We are also thankful to Sophia Izabella Garcia Rosenberg and Linnéa Mercedes Garcia Rosenberg for their help developing the figures.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research,authorship,and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article.

Author Biographies

Danilo Garcia,PhD,is an associate professor at the University of Gothenburg. He is currently the director of the Blekinge Center of Competence in Sweden,which focuses in education,research,and development of public health and healthcare. He is,together with Professor Trevor Archer and Doctor Max Rapp Ricciardi,the founder and lead researcher of the Network for Empowerment and Well-Being.

Lillemor Adrianson,PhD,is a researcher and lecturer at University of Borås.

Trevor Archer is a professor in biological psychology at the University of Gothenburg,currently writing about epigenetics in neuropsychiatry,the influence of physical exercise in Parkinson’s,Alzheimer’s,mood disorders,neuro-immune functioning,attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder,and traumatic brain function. His studies in psychology are presently focused on personal attributes and profiles associated with health and well-being. The outcomes of prevention and intervention methods and concepts present an area of considerable interest not least in lab studies.

Patricia Rosenberg has been a high school teacher for 12 years. Her main interests lie at the interface of religion and psychology. Her other interests are the use of taboo words in common language and also well-being coaching among youth.

References

Abele

A. E.

(2014). Pursuit of communal values in an agentic manner: A way to happiness? Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 1320. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01320

Adrianson

Ancok

Ramdhani

Archer

(2013). Cultural influences upon health, affect, self-esteem and impulsiveness: An Indonesian-Swedish comparison. International Journal of Research Studies in Psychology, 2(3), 25-44. doi:10.5861/ijrsp.2013.228

Aghababaei

Wasserman

J. A.

Nannini

(2014). The religious person revisited: Cross-cultural evidence from the HEXACO model of personality structure. Mental Health, Religion & Culture, 17, 24-29.

Allport

G. W.

Ross

J. M.

(1967). Personal religious orientation and prejudice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 5, 432-443.

Ames

D. R.

Rose

Anderson

C. P.

(2006). The NPI-16 as a short measure of narcissism. Journal of Research in Personality, 40, 440-450.

Archer

Adolfsson

Karlsson

(2008). Affective personality as cognitive-emotional presymptom profiles regulatory for self-reported health predispositions. Neurotoxicity Research, 14, 21-44.

Archer

Adrianson

Plancak

Karlsson

(2007). Influence of affective personality on cognitive-mediated emotional processing: Need for empowerment. European Journal of Psychiatry, 21, 21-44.

Archer

Garcia

(2014). Physical exercise influences academic performance and well-being in children and adolescents. International Journal of School and Cognitive Psychology, 1, e102. doi:10.4172/1234-3425.1000e102

Archer

Garcia

(2015). Empowerment components that endower resilience through positive affect: Character (hope and love), intrinsic motivation (agency), and locomotion (goal-pathway) [Manuscript submitted for publication].

10.

Baughman

H. M.

Dearing

Giammarco

Vernon

P. A.

(2012). Relationships between bullying behaviours and the Dark Triad: A study with adults. Personality and Individual Differences, 52, 571-575.

11.

Bood

S. Å.

Archer

Norlander

(2004). Affective personality in relation to general personality, self-reported stress, coping and optimism. Individual Differences Research, 2, 26-37.

12.

Buhrmester

M. D.

Kwang

Gosling

S. D.

(2011). Amazon’s Mechanical Turk: A new source of inexpensive, yet high-quality, data? Perspectives on Psychological Science, 6, 3-5.

13.

Carlo

Okun

M. A.

Knight

G. P.

Rosario

de Guzman

(2005). The interplay of traits and motives on volunteering: Agreeableness, extraversion and prosocial value motivation. Personality and Individual Differences, 38, 1293-1305.

14.

Cloninger

C. R.

(2004). Feeling good: The science of well-being. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

15.

Cloninger

C. R.

(2006). Fostering spirituality and well-being in clinical practice. Psychiatric Annals, 36, 1-6.

16.

Cloninger

C. R.

(2013). What makes people healthy, happy, and fulfilled in the face of current world challenges? Mens Sana Monographs, 1, 16-24.

17.

Cloninger

C. R.

Garcia

(2015). The heritability and development of positive affect and emotionality. In Pluess

(Ed.), Genetics of psychological well-being: The role of heritability and genetics in positive psychology (pp. 97-113). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

18.

Cloninger

C. R.

Svrakic

D. M.

Przybeck

T. R.

(1993). A psychobiological model of temperament and character. Archives of General Psychiatry, 50, 975-990.

19.

Cloninger

C. R.

Zohar

A. H.

(2011). Personality and the perception of health and happiness. Journal of Affect Disorder, 128(1-2), 24-32.

20.

Corr

P. J.

Kumari

Wilson

G. D.

Checkley

Gray

J. A.

(1997). Harm avoidance and affective modulation of the startle reflex: A replication. Personality and Individual Differences, 22, 591-593.

21.

Corr

P. J.

Wilson

G. D.

Fotiadou

Gray

N. S.

Checkley

Gray

J. A.

(1995). Personality and affective modulation of the startle reflex. Personality and Individual Differences, 19, 543-553.

22.

Costa

P. T.

McCrae

R. R.

(1992). Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R) and NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) professional manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.

23.

De Fruyt

Van De Wiele

Van Heeringen

. (2000). Cloninger’s psychobiological model of temperament and the five-factor model of personality. Personality and Individual Difference, 29, 441-452.

24.

De Fruyt

Van De Wiele

Van Heeringen

. (2006). The validity of Cloninger’s psychobiological model versus the five-factor model to predict DSM-IV personality disorders in a heterogeneous psychiatric sample: Facet and residualized facet descriptions. Journal of Personality, 74, 479-510.

25.

Douglas

Bore

Munro

(2012). Distinguishing the Dark Triad: Evidence from the five-factor model and the Hogan Development Survey. Scientific Research, 3, 237-242. doi:10.4236/psych.2012.33033

26.

Falhgren

Nima

A. A.

Archer

Garcia

(2015). Person-centered osteopathic practice: Patients’ personality (body, mind, and soul) and health (ill-being and well-being). PeerJ, 3, e1349. doi:10.7717/peerj.1349

27.

Ferguson

C. J.

(2009). An effect size primer: A guide for clinicians and researchers. Professional Psychology, Research and Practice, 40, 532-538.

28.

Fowles

D. C.

Dindo

(2006). A dual deficit model of psychopathy. In Patrick

C. J.

(Ed.), Handbook of psychopathy (pp. 14-34). New York, NY: Guilford Press.

29.

Fredrickson

B. L.

(1998). What good are positive emotions? Review of General Psychology, 2, 300-319. doi:10.1037/1089-2680.2.3.300

30.

Fredrickson

B. L.

(2006). The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions. In Csikszentmihalyi

Csikszentmihalyi

I. S.

(Eds.), A life worth living: Contributions to positive psychology (pp. 85-103). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

31.

Furnham

Richards

Paulhus

(2013). The Dark Triad: A 10 year review. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 7, 199-215.

32.

Furnham

Richards

Rangel

Jones

D. L.

(2014). Measuring malevolence: Quantitative issues surrounding the Dark Triad of personality. Personality and Individual Differences, 67, 114-121.

33.

Garcia

(2011). Adolescents’ happiness: The role of the affective temperament model on memory and apprehension of events, subjective well-being, and psychological well-being (Doctoral thesis). University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

34.

Garcia

(2012). The affective temperaments: Differences between adolescents in the Big Five Model and Cloninger’s psychobiological model of personality. Journal of Happiness Studies, 13, 999-1017. doi:10.1007/s10902-011-9303-5

35.

Garcia

(2015). The affective profile model: A person-centered model of the affective system. Manuscript submitted for publication.

36.

Garcia

Anckarsäter

Kjell

O. N. E.

Archer

Rosenberg

Cloninger

C. R.

Sikström

(2015). Agentic, communal, and spiritual traits are related to the semantic representation of written narratives of positive and negative life events. Psychology of Well-Being: Theory, Research and Practice, 5, Article 8. doi:10.1186/s13612-015-0035-x

37.

Garcia

Kerekes

Andersson-Arntén

A.-C.

Archer

(2012). Temperament, character, and adolescents’ depressive symptoms: Focusing on affect. Depression Research and Treatment, 2012, Article 925372. doi:10.1155/2012/925372

38.

Garcia

MacDonald

Archer

(2015). Two different approaches to the affective profiles model: Median splits (variable-oriented) and cluster analysis (person-oriented). PeerJ, 3, e1380. doi:10.7717/peerj.1380

39.

Garcia

Nima

A. A.

Kjell

O. N. E.

(2014). The affective profiles, psychological well-being, and harmony: Environmental mastery and self-acceptance predict the sense of a harmonious life. PeerJ, 2, e259. doi:10.7717/peerj.259

40.

Garcia

Rosenberg

(2015). The dark cube: Dark and ligth character profiles [Manuscript submitted for publication].

41.

Garcia

Schütz

Archer

(2015). Differences in happiness-increasing strategies between and within affective profiles. Manuscript submitted for publication.

42.

Gray

J. A.

(1981). A critique of Eysenck’s theory of personality. In Eysenck

H. J.

(Ed.), A model for personality (pp. 246-276). Berlin, Germany: Springer-Verlag.

43.

Hodson

Hogg

S. M.

MacInnis

C. C.

(2009). The role of ‘‘dark personalities’’ (narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy), Big Five personality factors, and ideology in explaining prejudice. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 686-690.

44.

Horton

J. J.

Rand

D. G.

Zeckhauser

R. J.

(2011). The online laboratory: Conducting experiments in a real labor market. Experimental Economics, 14, 399-425.

45.

Ito

T. A.

Cacciopo

J. T.

(1998). Representations of the contours of positive human health. Psychological Inquiry, 9, 43-48.

46.

Jakobwitz

Egan

(2006). The Dark Triad and normal personality. Personality and Individual Differences, 40, 331-339.

47.

Jimmefors

Garcia

Rosenberg

Mousavi

Adrianson

Archer

(2014). Locomotion (empowering) and assessment (disempowering), self-regulatory dimensions as a function of affective profile in high school students. International Journal of School and Cognitive Psychology, 2, 103. doi:10.4172/1234-3425.1000103

48.

Jonason

P. K.

N. P.

Buss

D. M.

(2010). The costs and benefits of the Dark Triad: Implications for mate poaching and mate retention tactics. Personality and Individual Differences, 48, 373-378.

49.

Jonason

P. K.

N. P.

Czarna

A. Z.

(2013). Quick and dirty: Some psychosocial costs associated with the Dark Triad in three countries. Evolutionary Psychology, 11, 172-185.

50.

Jonason

P. K.

N. P.

Webster

G. W.

Schmitt

D. P.

(2009). The Dark Triad: Facilitating short-term mating in men. European Journal of Personality, 23, 5-18.

51.

Jonason

P. K.

Luévano

V. X.

(2013). Walking the thin line between efficiency and accuracy: Validity and structural properties of the Dirty Dozen. Personality and Individual Differences, 55, 76-81.

52.

Jonason

P. K.

Slomski

Partyka

(2012). The Dark Triad at work: How toxic employees get their way. Personality and Individual Differences, 52, 449-453.

53.

Jonason

P. K.

Tost

(2010). I just cannot control myself: The Dark Triad and self-control. Personality and Individual Differences, 49, 611-615.

54.

Jonason

P. K.

Webster

G. D.

(2010). The Dirty Dozen: A concise measure of the Dark Triad. Psychological Assessment, 22, 420-432.

55.

Jones

D. N.

(2013). Psychopathy and Machiavellianism predict differences in racially motivated attitudes and their affiliations. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 43, 367-378.

56.

Jones

D. N.

Figueredo

A. J.

(2013). The core of darkness: Uncovering the heart of the Dark Triad. European Journal of Personality, 27, 521-531.

57.

Jones

D. N.

Paulhus

D. L.

(2011). Differentiating the Dark Triad within the interpersonal circumplex. In Horowitz

L. M.

Strack

(Eds.), Handbook of interpersonal psychology: Theory, research, assessment, and therapeutic interventions (pp. 249-268). New York, NY: Wiley.

58.

Jones

D. N.

Paulhus

D. L.

(2014). Introducing the Short Dark Triad (SD3): A brief measure of dark personalities. Assessment, 21, 28-42.

59.

Josefsson

Merjonen

Jokela

Pulkki-Råback

Keltikangas-Järvinen

(2011). Personality profiles identify depressive symptoms over ten years? A population-based study. Depression Research and Treatment, 2011, Article 431314.

60.

Keren

Schul

(2009). Two is not always better than one: A critical evaluation of two-system theories. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 4, 533-550.

61.

Kerig

P. K.

Stellwagen

K. K.

(2010). Roles of callous-unemotional traits, narcissism, and Machiavellianism in childhood aggression. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, 32, 343-352.

62.

Lannin

D. G.

Guyll

Krizan

Madon

Cornish

(2014). When are grandiose and vulnerable narcissists least helpful? Personality and Individual Differences, 56, 127-132.

63.

Larsen

R. J.

Ketelaar

(1991). Personality and susceptibility to positive and negative emotional states. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 61, 132-140.

64.

Lau

K. S. L.

Marsee

M. A.

(2013). Exploring narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism in youth: Examination of associations with antisocial behavior and aggression. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 22, 355-367.

65.

Lee

Ashton

M. C.

(2005). Psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism in the Five-Factor model and the HEXACO model of personality structure. Personality and Individual Differences, 38, 1571-1582.

66.

Lee

Ashton

M. C.

Wiltshire

Bourdage

J. S.

Visser

B. A.

Gallucci

(2013). Sex, power and money. European Journal of Personality, 27, 169-184.

67.

Linton

D. K.

Power

J. L.

(2013). The personality traits of workplace bullies are often shared by their victims: Is there a dark side to victims? Personality and Individual Differences, 54, 738-743.

68.

Love

Holder

M. D.

(2014). Psychopathy and subjective well-being. Personality and Individual Differences, 66, 112-117.

69.

MacDonald

Kormi-Nouri

(2013). The affective personality, sleep, and autobiographical memories. The Journal of Positive Psychology, 8, 305-313.

70.

MacLeod

Moore

(2000). Positive thinking revised: Positive cognitions, well-being and mental health. Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy, 7, 1-10.

71.

Miller

J. D.

Lynam

D. R.

(2012). An examination of the Psychopathic Personality Inventory’s nomological network: A meta-analytic review. Personality Disorders: Theory, Research, and Treatment, 3, 305-326.

72.

Muris

Meester

Timmermans

(2013). Some youths have a gloomy side: Correlates of the Dark Triad personality traits in non-clinical adolescents. Child Psychiatry & Human Development, 44, 658-665. doi:10.1007/s10578-013-0359-9

73.

Norlander

Bood

S.-Å.

Archer

(2002). Performance during stress: Affective personality age, and regularity of physical exercise. Social Behavior and Personality, 30, 495-508.

74.

Norlander

Johansson

Å.

Bood

S.-Å

. (2005). The affective personality: Its relation to quality of sleep, well-being and stress. Social Behavior and Personality, 33, 709-722.

75.

Palomo

Beninger

R. J.

Kostrzewa

R. M.

Archer

(2008). Focusing on symptoms rather than diagnoses in brain dysfunction: Conscious and nonconscious expression in impulsiveness and decision making. Neurotoxicity Research, 14, 1-20.

76.

Palomo

Kostrzewa

R. M.

Beninger

R. J.

Archer

(2007). Treatment consideration and manifest complexity in comorbid neuropsychiatric disorders. Neurotoxicity Research, 12, 43-60.

77.

Paolacci

Chandler

Ipeirotis

P. G.

(2010). Running experiments on Amazon Mechanical Turk. Judgment and Decision Making, 5, 411-419.

78.

Paulhus

D. L.

Abild

M. L.

(2011). Values matter: Casting the House characters onto the interpersonal circumplex. In Martin

L. L.

Cascio

(Eds.), House and psychology. New York, NY: Wiley.

79.

Paulhus

D. L.

Jones

D. N.

(2014). Measuring dark personalities. In Boyle

G. J.

Saklofske

D. H.

Matthews

(Eds.), Measures of personality and social psychological constructs (pp. 445-451). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.

80.

Paulhus

D. L.

Williams

(2002). The Dark Triad of personality: Narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. Journal of Research in Personality, 36, 556-568.

81.

Rapp Ricciardi

Åkerman

Eerikäinen

Ambjörnsson

Andersson-Arntén

A.-C.

Archer

Garcia

. (2014). Understanding Group and Leader (UGL) trainers’ personality characteristics and affective profiles. Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 1191. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2014.01191

82.

Rauthmann

J. F.

Kolar

G. P.

(2013). Positioning the Dark Triad in the interpersonal circumplex: The friendly-dominant narcissist, hostile-submissive Machiavellian, and hostile-dominant psychopath? Personality and Individual Differences, 54, 622-627.

83.

Rauthmann

J. F.

Will

(2011). Proposing a multidimensional Machiavellianism conceptualization. Social Behavior and Personality, 39, 391-404.

84.

Russell

J. A.

(1980). A circumplex model of affect. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 1161-1178.

85.

Schütz

Archer

Garcia

(2013). Character profiles and adolescents’ self-reported affect. Personality and Individual Differences, 54, 841-844. doi:10.1016/j.paid.2012.12.020

86.

Schütz

Sailer

Nima

Rosenberg

Andersson-Arntén

A.-C.

Archer

Garcia

(2013). The affective profiles in the USA: Happiness, depression, life satisfaction, and happiness- increasing strategies. PeerJ, 1, e156. doi:10.7717/peerj.156

87.

Sedikides

Gebauer

J. E.

(2010). Religiosity as self-enhancement: A meta-analysis of the relation between socially desirable responding and religiosity. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 14, 17-36.

88.

Shapiro

D. N.

Chandler

Mueller

P. A.

(2013). Using Mechanical Turk to study clinical populations. Clinical Psychological Science, 1, 213-220.

89.

Tabachnick

B. G.

Fidell

L. S.

(2007). Using multivariate statistics (5th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education.

90.

Tellegen

(1993). Folk concepts and psychological concepts of personality and personality disorder. Psychological Inquiry, 4, 122-130.

91.

Thoreau

H. D.

(2009). Civil disobedience. New York, NY: Classic Books America.

92.

Vernon

P. A.

Villani

V. C.

Vickers

L. C.

Harris

J. A.

(2008). A behavioral genetic investigation of humour styles and their correlations with the Big-5 personality dimensions. Personality and Individual Differences, 44, 1116-1125.

93.

Veselka

Schermer

J. A.

Vernon

P. A.

(2012). The Dark Triad and an expanded framework of personality. Personality and Individual Differences, 53, 417-425.

94.

Watson

(2002). Positive affectivity: The disposition to experience pleasurable emotional states. In Snyder

C. R.

Lopez

S. J.

(Eds.), Handbook of positive psychology (pp. 106-119). New York, UK: Oxford University Press.

95.

Watson

Clark

L. A.

(1994). The PANAS-X: Manual for the positive and negative affect schedule—Expanded form. Boise: University of Iowa Press.

96.

Watson

Clark

L. A.

Tellegen

(1988). Development and validation of brief measures of positive and negative affect: The PANAS scales. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54, 1063-1070.

97.

Watson

Wiese

Vaidya

Tellegen

(1999). The two general activation systems of affect: Structural findings, evolutionary considerations, and psychobiological evidence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76, 820-838.

98.

White

B. A.

(2014). Who cares when nobody is watching? Psychopathic traits and empathy in prosocial behaviors. Personality and Individual Differences, 56, 116-121.

The Dark Side of the Affective Profiles

Abstract

Keywords

The Dark Triad: Psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and Narcissism

A Dyad of Personality Models: The Dark Triad and the Big Five Model

The Present Study

Method

Ethics Statement

Participants and Procedure

Instruments

Positive Affect and Negative Affect Schedule

The Dark Triad Dirty Dozen

Statistical Treatment

Results

Discussion

Limitations and Strengths of the Present Study

Conclusion and Final Remarks

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

Funding

Author Biographies

References