Talk:Dark triad

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Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): MichaelMalek. Peer reviewers: Adam firlotte.

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Another source
Daniel Goleman's book Social Intelligence has a good chapter on this. FreplySpang 01:48, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Deficiency
How does psychology determine what a "deficiency" is? Is there a set of criteria of behaviors? I looked around a little and couldn't find any cases of the of the word being used in a way that I was sure it was here. Would like more information please. 71.166.6.10 (talk) 20:22, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * See Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders -- I'ḏ  ♥  One  00:17, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Editorializing?
Not making any edit because I'm not confident enough in my point, but the last section really reads like a very biased US-centric political point. Does it really convey any new, useful information? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.97.68.15 (talk) 11:50, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Does the content on evolution need citations? For example, "most researchers" and "some argue" are vague. In addition, I'm not sure if the discussion of group selection and selfish gene theory are accurate or even relevant. Group selection is defined incorrectly and is not "antiquated and generally rejected". "Modern evolutionary biology" does not unilaterally take the selfish gene approach. The entire paragraph on the selfish gene approach sounds like an original analysis as opposed to a synthesis of existing work, and it does not indicate whether any scholars have actually applied this analysis to the topic of the Dark Triad. I'm going to start by removing these four sentences. If someone can rewrite these to show relevance, and to include citations, they could be added back to the article. Otherwise, the rest of the "In general" paragraph should be removed. Please correct me if I'm out of line--thanks. dz7 (talk) 04:40, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Dark triad and agreeableness
In regards to the statement that "agreeableness had nothing to do with the core of the dark triad", I was wondering if this might be toned down a bit as it might be misleading to readers not familiar with statistical concepts. I've been unable to access the paper this is cited from as it is still in press, so I'm not completely sure I understand it. But what it sounds like is that callous manipulative traits are the common core of the dark triad and when this is statistically controlled for, the broader agreeableness trait becomes non-significant as a predictor. What I think might be misleading to some is that as it is currently written, it might give some people the impression that the dark triad is not really related to (dis)agreeableness at all. Previous research has found substantial negative correlations between callous manipulative traits and agreeableness, so there is an important overlap between the narrower traits of the dark triad and the broader agreeableness factor. Perhaps it might be more enlightening to readers to say something to the effect that the overlap between the various dark triad traits is due to a shared core of callousness and manipulation and that this is a more specific predictor than (dis)agreeableness broadly. It might also be clearer to state something like the three members of the dark triad are distinct and separate traits when callousness and manipulation are accounted for, rather than that they are "unrelated" as this might be confusing to lay readers.--Smcg8374 (talk) 01:39, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

Dark triad and chinese zodiac - is this for real?
A new section was recently added about a supposed dark triad in the Chinese zodiac. No reference was provided and a quick google search turned up no mention of this. Therefore, I have deleted this addition as no evidence has been provided to verify that this is a real thing. If it turns out I am wrong, I will apologise, but I can't help but suspect that this may be a hoax.--Smcg8374 (talk) 04:41, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

The dark triad represented in video games
Y'all remember Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, right? I played through that game twice, once making decisions how I personally would make them...morally upright, always generous (i.e. sparing people and giving away money and helping them with their problems). Then I played through it again, aiming to be the darkest Sith lord that had ever walked the galaxy. I killed, stole, spat on people when they asked for help. In the end, my light side character had more money and items than I knew what to do with, and my dark side character was always needing to stretch those last few credits just to survive from mission to mission, illustrating the point about these dark triad-heavy folks who don't plan for the future, want their money now, end up with less in the long run.

Same thing happened in Skyrim. The more I stole, the harder it was to become rich. But give a couple gold coins to a beggar, or buy a guy a drink at the Bee & Barb, and thy cup shall overfloweth. Truth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kjekkaste (talk • contribs) 04:37, 18 March 2014 (UTC)

Contested deletion
This page should not be speedily deleted because it has plenty of academic studies: https://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?q=%22Dark+triad%22&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ved=0CB4QgQMwAGoVChMIsY7-mK3JxwIVA0bbCh0QXgnO. Deleting this article is a 100% ridiculous idea. --Penbat (talk) 13:24, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
 * You are free to voice your opinion Articles for deletion/Dark triad (1st nomination). Libercht (talk) 13:30, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

Lead Changes
A description of the dark triad traits is, quite obviously, key information and more important than the other lead content. In fact it's critical to the reader's understanding of the article. Please explain what you mean by abiding by 'English language structure' - I don't think anyone understands what you mean by this. Please also cite the specific part of the manual which suggests the original organization is breaking some rules. The new organization does not flow nearly as well. It, for example, makes much more sense to explain the dark triad before discussing its occasional applications, as is the case, for example, with the Psychopathy article. There were no such complaints until now. Elaboration is appreciated. --Humorideas (talk) 23:31, 12 May 2016 (UTC)


 * EDIT: To emphasize the information below, this article was previously nominated for deletion because people don't understand what the topic is about, and think it's just a summary of negative personality traits. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Dark_triad_%281st_nomination%29


 * The dark triad is a subject in psychology that focuses on three personality traits: narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy This sentence provides links to the articles for each trait. This article is about the dark triad, it is not a summary of the personality traits. That information can be found in the body of the article or from the linked articles.


 * All three dark triad traits are conceptually distinct although empirical evidence shows them to be overlapping. They are associated with a callous-manipulative interpersonal style. This sentence explains that the traits are "conceptually distinct", but doesn't explain how. A summary of each trait thus clarifies the statement, highlighting how they are conceptually distinct. The summary belongs under the statement.


 * Research on the dark triad is used in applied psychology... This paragraph didn't exist until recently, when I added it in. It explains what the dark triad is. Again, this article is about the dark triad, it is not a summary of three individual personality traits. The lead of an article is to give a quick overview on what the topic is about. In this case, it is a subject in psychology, which is used in applied psychology etc.


 * The previous version of this article started with this sentence The dark triad is a group of three personality traits: narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy. OK, it's a group of three personality traits, that doesn't really explain anything. There was no information on what the purpose of this "group" is or why it exists. But following that sentence was a summary of the traits, that doesn't explain anything about the dark triad. It was a poorly written lead. Now it states that the dark triad is a subject in psychology. It's used in applied psychology within a variety of different fields. While it is a group of three different personality traits, science shows them to be overlapping etc. It concisely informs the reader about the topic.


 * An earlier version of this article was even worse. This is what was written before in the lead, Jakobwitz and Egan carried out a factor analysis and found agreeableness strongly dissociated with these traits, and other factors, such as neuroticism and a lack of conscientiousness, associated with some traits. What is Jakobwitz and Egan? There were no links to what agreeableness is and so on. It was terrible writing and left the reader in the dark. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 14.203.60.24 (talk) 11:16, 13 May 2016 (UTC)

Concept Gap: Personality Theory
This article has largely relevant topics. Perhaps the most distracting thing in the reading is the labeling of "Perspectives" to describe aspects such as the workplace, internet trolls, etc. This seems to be simply a miscellaneous categorization (although it appears to be rooted in the various arenas in which the dark triad may surface), and the target of my most significant recommendation is either relabeling this section or moving these subsections to other places in the article. Tim Kruper (talk) 21:00, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

SciAm article about the "General Dark Factor of Personality" (D-factor)
Here's a link to the article for those knowledgeable to incorporate into the main article, if appropriate. https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-dark-core-of-personality?utm_source=pocket-newtab Phantom in ca (talk) 20:28, 24 May 2020 (UTC)


 * This does not belong here, because the D-factor is none of the traits the umbrella term Dark Triad describes, nor does is it confined to the commonalities of the dark triad traits, but refers to any aversive trait and thus also those beyond the dark triad components. 87.141.121.105 (talk) 10:56, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Correlation both ways?
There's a passage in the article which reads: "Honesty-Humility has been found to be strongly, negatively correlated to the dark triad traits. Likewise, all three dark triad traits are strongly negatively correlated with Honesty-Humility." – but if X is correlated with Y, Y is also by necessity correlated with X. So the second sentence here seems to me to be nothing more than a restatement of the first? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ergwald (talk • contribs) 21:08, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Merge proposal
I propose that Dark core of personality and Dark triad be merged to Dark personality (a new page). Alright. I'm off to set up all the tags. --Xurizuri (talk) 09:51, 1 October 2021 (UTC) Pinging editors that I saw as being fairly involved with the articles (anyone else, feel free to do the same):, , , , ,. --Xurizuri (talk) 10:29, 1 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I've found more references in literature to "dark personality". That gap gets wider if you add in "dark traits of personality" which is in many ways just a long-winded way of saying the same thing.
 * The core and the triad are sub-concepts of dark personality.
 * With the heavily related concepts of the tetrad and the vulnerable triad, the dark triad is an increasingly murky concept which is better captured as dark personality.
 * The core in particular exists almost exclusively within the concepts of dark personality and the triad(s)/tetrad. It's not an ideal stand-alone article, if it got expanded from its current stubby form it would in largely replicate this one.


 * Do you have sources to show broad use of the term "Dark personality"? Looks like most sources on "Dark core of personality" use "Dark triad", so seems to me that would be the best name for the page. But I'm open to other ideas if there is more information about use of jargon. — Chris Capoccia 💬 12:11, 1 October 2021 (UTC)


 * I found way more hits for "dark triad" (16100) than "dark personality" (4200). It seems to be like Dark core of personality should be redirected to Dark triad.--Megaman en m (talk) 16:26, 1 October 2021 (UTC)


 * , to be fair, do you have sources that demonstrate that triad is currently the most common? And, WP:HITS - with a major limitation of a search test in this specific case being that, even in a study that refers to dark personality, they have to use the Short Dark Triad to measure it. And more than that, as I said before, the dark triad is an increasingly murky concept - my argument is essentially based on WP:PAGEDECIDE, particularly that, here, . There is no particular reason why the dark tetrad would be described in detail in an article on the dark triad other than that it provides - and then, . By merging them to dark personality, it allows a fuller discussion of the traits which have been associated with dark personalities, including those ones proposed for the dark tetrad. Without having to pretend that the internet troll study used the triad. (Also sorry, I couldn't find the wp:pagedecide link earlier. Would've made my argument a bit more cogent.) --Xurizuri (talk) 01:18, 3 October 2021 (UTC)
 * sources are the ones used in dark triad and dark core of personality: 5 mentions in the titles of the sources for "dark personality" vs vs 35 for "dark triad". — Chris Capoccia 💬 11:28, 3 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Look I've remembered that I don't actually have a strong opinion on this part of the merge (I sometimes get over-committed to having a position and forget) so I will actually just back down from this particular hill. I'm resetting my stated viewpoint to neutral about dark triad vs. dark personality. I'm gonna close the discussion now. --Xurizuri (talk) 02:21, 17 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree, merge to to Dark triad. Johnbod (talk) 16:42, 1 October 2021 (UTC)

Psychopathy and the Big Five
19/10/21: Psychopathy has been found to correlate with all of the Big Five personality factors: extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism and openness.[clarification needed]

22. Vernon, Philip A.; Martin, Rod A.; Schermer, Julie Aitken; MacKie, Ashley (2008). "A behavioral genetic investigation of humor styles and their correlations with the Big-5 personality dimensions". Personality and Individual Differences. 44 (5): 1116–1125. doi:10.1016/j.paid.2007.11.003.

Reference may be incorrect: abstract does not mention psychopathy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Peaceandlonglife (talk • contribs) 11:17, 25 October 2021 (UTC)

02/09/21: Psychopathy has been found to correlate with all of the Big Five personality factors: extraversion (r = .34), agreeableness (r = −.25), conscientiousness (r = −.24), 	neuroticism (r = −.34) and openness (r = .24).

23. Vernon, Philip A.; Villani, Vanessa C.; Vickers, Leanne C.; Harris, Julie Aitken (January 2008). "A behavioral genetic investigation of the Dark Triad and the Big 5". Personality and Individual Differences. 44 (2): 445–452. doi:10.1016/j.paid.2007.09.007.

Quotation was selective.

Vernon, Villani, Vickers, Harris & Aitken (2008): Correlations have ... been reported between the Dark Triad and the Big 5 variables, although results have been inconsistent. Paulhus and Williams (2002), for example, reported Lee and Ashton (2005) reported similar correlations but Jakobwitz and Egan (2006) found no significant correlations between the Dark Triad and either openness or extraversion. (p 446)
 * that narcissism correlated positively with extraversion (r = .42) and openness (r = .38) and negatively with agreeableness (r = −.36);
 * that Machiavellianism correlated negatively with agreeableness (r = −.47) and conscientiousness (r = −.34); and
 * that psychopathy correlated with all Big 5 variables: extraversion (r = .34), agreeableness (r = −.25), conscientiousness (r = −.24), neuroticism (r = −.34) and openness (r = .24).

Table 3: Multivariate genetic analyses of the NEO personality scale scores with narcissism, Machiavellianism, and sub-clinical psychopathy.

Sub-clinical psychopathy:
 * Neuroticism (rp = .13)
 * Extraversion (rp = .05)
 * Openness to experience (rp = .01)
 * Agreeableness (rp = −.59)
 * Conscientiousness (rp = −.37)

rp = phenotypic (observed) correlation

(p 450)

[We] only found significant (negative) correlations between psychopathy and agreeableness and conscientiousness. (p 451)

Summary

Out of these four groups:
 * two found positive correlations with extraversion and openness, however, two found no correlation;
 * two found a negative correlation with neuroticism, one no correlation, and one a positive correlation;
 * three found a negative correlation with conscientiousness, one found no correlation; and
 * all found a negative correlation with agreeableness.

So, psychopaths tend to be disagreeable and lacking in conscientiousness.

Peaceandlonglife (talk) 14:39, 23 October 2021 (UTC)

Conflict of interest editing regarding emotional intelligence section
Regarding this edit, it appears that the removed section was added and edited by several editors whose usernames suggest a conflict of interest. Since this content doesn't really fit comfortably in Dark triad, this veers into spamming. Any disinterested editor who has reviewed these sources should feel free to revert, but I would also recommend rephrasing or expanding to make the connection between emotional intelligence and personality theory explicit instead of merely implied. Grayfell (talk) 02:35, 6 April 2022 (UTC)


 * I would add that the Dark Triad is no model (in a stricter sense) at all, so the section heading more correctly should be "relationship to models of basic personality". 2001:7C0:3100:10:0:0:0:1A (talk) 14:01, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

Split proposal
Contrary to the merge proposal above, I request to split Dark Triad and Dark Factor of Personality (D-factor). Reasons:
 * The dark triad is just an umbrella term (and not a "theory"; nothing is said on why these occur, why these are related, what are the consequences, etc.; it is not even intended as a taxonomy) for three specific aversive traits, i.e., Machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy
 * Any other aversive trait does not belong here. This also includes sadism (which together with the dark triad traits is sometimes called "dark tetrad").
 * The D factor is neither one of the dark triad traits, nor is is confined to these traits. The concept refers to the commonalities of any aversive trait and thus well extends beyond the dark triad traits and also refers to, say, greed, egoism, envy, spitefulness, moral disengagement, psychological entitlement, sadism, amoralism, and many more.

In any case, the D factor does not belong in an article about the dark triad, so the section should be deleted. If anything, a section on the commonalities between these three traits could be added, including a reference to the D factor. But again, the D factor is no theory about the dark triad in particular, so there is no point to dwell at length here.

If the decision instead rather would be do rename the article to "dark" or "aversive personality", then the whole dark triad concept doesn't make much sense, as it is no more than an umbrella term. At the same time, there are many many aversive traits which would need coverage to make this meaningful. So this would essentially require an entire rewrite. 87.141.121.105 (talk) 11:17, 21 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Pinging those involved in the merge proposal:     79.253.40.56 (talk) 19:21, 6 September 2022 (UTC)


 * sorry, out of my depth here. Johnbod (talk) 03:28, 7 September 2022 (UTC)


 * I would soft agree with you on splitting them due to them being conceptually and theoretically distinct (but related) entities.--Megaman en m (talk) 09:00, 7 September 2022 (UTC)
 * All I did was reformat refs. I don't care about page split, but there should be some reliable sources to support how the pages are organized one way or the other. — Chris Capoccia 💬 11:58, 7 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Here are some sources (mostly academic papers):
 * For the point that "Dark Triad" is just an umbrella term, see here and here.
 * For the point that there are many more aversive traits, see here, and here, and here (none of these are actually comprehensive, but so be it).
 * For the point that the D factor is not restricted to the Dark Triad traits, see here and here. 79.253.39.112 (talk) 19:35, 7 September 2022 (UTC)

Subclinical psychopathy definition
Subclinical psychopathy: "Subclinical psychopathy refers to individuals who exhibit many of the characteristics of psychopathy, except for some of the more severe antisocial behaviors. This constellation of traits allows the subclinical psychopath to avoid incarceration." It is simply a less severe form of psychopathy.

It does not mean that they are present in the general population as opposed to clinical settings. Clinical psychopathy is also present in the general population before getting caught. In clinical settings, one may be diagnosed as subclinical psychopathy or clinical psychopathy. 2600:6C44:117F:95BE:1D96:C2A3:8180:B587 (talk) 19:56, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Personality Theory
— Assignment last updated by Adwf2 (talk) 04:26, 30 March 2023 (UTC)