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Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

psyche.co

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Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#61

Post by postingpals »

Dark traits are helpful once you are actually in the position of power. This article thought dark traits might help get you there, but this is not the case. The economic system rewards leaders who are cut throat and rewards subordinates who are kind, it makes a lot of sense when you frame it that way really.

If you are a CEO the system will reward you for paying people less wages so you can beat out competition.

If you are a worker the system will reward you for kissing the CEO's ass (by not punishing you).

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#62

Post by mercurialshark »

ardy42 wrote: post #53
bonoboTP wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, narcissistsic sociopaths can have a high capacity for empathy in the sense of knowing what others feel and think while also ruthlessly manipulating, being two-faced based on who is present and the gaslighting others when these obvious differences are brought up (differences like switching the entire tone of voice and mannerisms at the flip of a switch, as if it was new person, just to suck up to or put down peo…

> Also, narcissistsic sociopaths can have a high capacity for empathy in the sense of knowing what others feel and think while also ruthlessly manipulating I initially thought this wasn't considered empathy, but TIL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empathy#Classification : > Empathy is generally divided into two major components: ... > Affective empathy, also called emotional empathy: the capacity to respond with an ap…

> Affective empathy, also called emotional empathy: the capacity to respond with an appropriate emotion to another's mental states.

This is what I meant by "emotional intelligence" in the comment below.

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#63

Post by kjlkjoxcvxch »

wpietri wrote: post #22

The question I'd rather ask: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed in systems set up by people with dark personality traits? Traits only have meaning in an environment, a context. It's not clear how much we can control the traits. But we definitely can control the environment. The modern corporation only goes back to the age of railroads. Many of our governmental systems don't go back much fa…

I think an even better, albeit harder, question would be "how can we set up systems such that even when they're gamed they result in positive outcomes?".

Any system with incentives can be gamed. Those that learn to game systems as a means to survival are always going to be adept at manipulating those systems.

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#64

Post by incrudible »

Personality traits that are not advantageous in some way are unlikely to be maintained over many generations of evolution.

Personality traits that are universally advantageous would not be discernible as traits, because they would become universal to everyone.

Therefore, all personality traits must also be disadvantageous in some way.

So-called "dark trait" behaviors obviously confer advantages at least in the short term. In the long run, we're all dead, but early success compounds, like interest.

Some of the luckiest psychopaths will end up at the very top, while some of the unluckiest will end up six feet under.

This is difficult to accurately capture in statistics, but the expected gain from "dark triad" traits across the whole population is probably zero.

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#65

Post by proverbialbunny »

I would take this article with a grain of salt. It gets a lot wrong and a lot of it is questionable.

For example, notice something about the stats it gives throughout the article? It's whole numbers, and with large variations: 10-20 per cent of individuals, 30-50 per cent of people, and so on. That variation and the whole numbers should be a read flag. When performing a study very precise numbers pop up. This isn't a confidence interval they're calculating, it's made up numbers. (The real numbers btw are between 8 and 9% of the US population.)

Let's look at the premise:

>For 15 years, research into dark personality traits (including narcissism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism) has been rapidly expanding.

Straight from the get go it uses fuzzy or vague terminology. Furthermore, it does not attempt to explain its chosen initial terminology.

The actual terminology is:

- ASPD for something close to the Hollywood psychopathy/sociopathy stereotype, there is no official psychopath in the DSM.

- Narcissism is NPD, and NPD is quite different from what people typically call a narcissist looking at themselves in the mirror, so the audience is going to misunderstand without explanation.

- Machiavellianism. It explains how countries slowly take over land of other countries. It explains how to maintain power on a national level once you have it, and so on. I admit I don't even know what the machiavellianism stereotype is. Maybe Game of Thrones and people backstabbing each other? That is not Machiavellian.

Using vague terminology is a way to get people to believe things without questioning them. It gets the audience to think they know the topic on a deep level, but instead their understanding is reduced. A lot of conspiracy theory websites do this, and even political websites as of late. Sadly, at times, vague terminology can be used as a technique to manipulate people. Fuzzy terminology is a red flag when validating a source.

I could keep going and critique this article all the way through, but it would be quite a long post. (eg, they say these characteristics are more common in men, but there are more female narcissists than there are males, which is the largest group.) In short, a healthy dose of skepticism is helpful. The article aims to solidify a stereotype, that makes it easier for actual bad actors to not be identified. Sadly, reality is darker than these stereotypes.

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#66

Post by dirtnugget »

I can kind of feel this articles point. Due to some life-changing events and a bipolar disorder I have developed quite some of these dark traits. But they do tend to come and go. I am not proud of them but they did help me establish myself professionally on some levels while dragging me down on others.o My soft side would usually be very sorry and forgiving while the darker side would push my ego.

I had one episode where the darker side took over. I felt like a king, not respecting others opinions on me. For the first time I had this self-esteem which my soft side was lacking. I did actually double my salary with that dark side but ever since I feel completely lonely.

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#67

Post by adrian_mrd »

kjlkjoxcvxch wrote: post #57
pizza234 wrote: post #6

The test itself is very well done - they try to get people to respond precisely, but checking attention, and asking multiple times questions about the same concept. However, the article has a very fundamental flaw: > Unfortunately, most people with extreme levels of dark personality traits don’t want to change who they are. Despite not being particularly happy with their lives The test doesn't deal with "happiness" a…

Using a throwaway for obvious reasons. I've been diagnosed as having narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) by several doctors so maybe I can shed some light on this. NPD is the inability to generate and/or experience internal validation. It is the lack of internal voice saying "good job". NPD is not self-aggrandizement although that is a common coping mechanism used to deal with the underlying disorder. I don't thi…

Thanks for sharing your experiences of being diagnosed with NPD.

I was wondering what made you get referred to the ‘several doctors’ in the first instance, and what treatments did they recommend to help manage your NPD?

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#68

Post by IfOnlyYouKnew »

adnzzzzZ wrote: post #7

>Overall, individuals with dark traits engage in more counterproductive work behaviour, such as theft and abusive supervision. Perhaps unsurprisingly, they don’t end up with higher average incomes than their peers with light personalities. >The key factor here seems to be empathy: the capacity to resonate with – and understand the perspective of – the emotional experiences of others. Individuals with light personalit…

> that higher agreeableness (more empathy) has a negative effect on salary,

That seems plausible or even obvious. All things being equal, an empathetic person will value a happy work environment (relatively) more than a high salary. They'll avoid the sabotage-all-others big law firm and go into research (avoiding personal conflicts), become a public defender (empathy), judge, etc.

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#69

Post by courtf »

incrudible wrote: post #64

Personality traits that are not advantageous in some way are unlikely to be maintained over many generations of evolution. Personality traits that are universally advantageous would not be discernible as traits, because they would become universal to everyone. Therefore, all personality traits must also be disadvantageous in some way. So-called "dark trait" behaviors obviously confer advantages at least in the short…

Great comment! High risk, high reward behavior, almost by definition, doesn't often seem too appealing when looking at the averages. We aren't the only organism that loves to gamble though, and there's a reason for that.

Re: Are people with dark personality traits more likely to succeed?

#70

Post by alexpetralia »

incrudible wrote: post #59
alexpetralia wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does high agreeableness necessarily translate into more empathy, or vice versa? I define empathy as "knowing your customer" (whoever it may be). You can be very attuned to this whether you are agreeable or disagreeable, no? (Perhaps this is not a widely accepted definition of empathy, and that definition instead somehow indicates "being nice"? I don't think being nice/agreeable necessarily helps you know who you're s…

Empathy is feeling what others feel. In other words, if I hurt you, I not only understand that you are hurt, I would be hurt myself. Psychopaths are incapable of empathy, but it would make sense if lack of empathy were advantageous from an evolutionary perspective.

Isn't this sympathy?
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