- 1School of Psychology, University of Western Sydney, Bankstown, NSW, Australia. p.jonason@uws.edu.au
Abstract
The current studies examined how the Dark Triad
personality traits (i.e., Machiavellianism, narcissism, and
psychopathy) facilitate the strategic structuring of an individual's
social environment in terms of same- and opposite-sex friends. In one
study using normative questions (N = 267) and another using a
budget-allocation task (N = 114), we found that the Dark Triad
traits were associated with choosing friends for strategic purposes and
to create a volatile environment. Narcissistic individuals reported
relatively more reasons to form friendships, such as shared interests,
makes me feel good, and intelligence. Women high in narcissism chose
same-sex friends who were attractive and women high on Machiavellianism
chose same-sex friends who have social status. Men high on psychopathy
devalued traits associated with good social relationships in favor of
friends who could facilitate their mating efforts and to offset risks
incurred in their life history
strategy. Results are discussed using the
selection-manipulation-evocation framework for explaining how
personality traits interact with social environments and integrated with
findings from evolutionary biology.
