Pathological personality traits and immoral tendencies

Pathological personality traits and immoral tendencies. Jennifer K. Vrabela et al. Personality and Individual Differences, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2018.02.043

Highlights
•    Antagonism and disinhibition were associated with most of the immoral tendencies.
•    Negative affectivity had positive associations with greed and anger.
•    Negative affectivity had positive associations with benign and malicious envy.
•    Detachment was associated with malicious envy.
•    Psychoticism was not associated with any of the immoral tendencies.

Abstract: The overarching goal of the present studies was to explore the connections between pathological personality traits and an array of immoral tendencies. Across three studies, we predicted that individuals with certain pathological personality traits (e.g., antagonism) would be more likely to exhibit immoral tendencies (e.g., greed, envy). The results of Study 1 (N = 714) revealed that antagonism, disinhibition, and negative affectivity had unique positive associations with greed. The results of Study 2 (N = 1134) showed that antagonism and negative affectivity had unique positive associations with benign and malicious envy, whereas detachment had a positive association with malicious envy. The results of Study 3 (N = 476) showed that antagonism and disinhibition had unique positive associations with most of the “seven deadly sins” (e.g., anger, lust, pride), whereas negative affectivity had less consistent associations with the seven deadly sins. Discussion focuses on the implications of these results for understanding the links between pathological personality traits and immoral tendencies.