A New Approach to Desirable Responding: Multidimensional Item Response Model of Overclaiming Data.

A variety of approaches have been presented for assessing desirable responding in self-report measures. Among them, the overclaiming technique asks respondents to rate their familiarity with a large set of real and nonexistent items (foils). The application of signal detection formulas to the endorsement rates of real items and foils yields indices of (a) and (b) .

Dark or disturbed?: Predicting aggression from the Dark Tetrad and schizotypy.

Research on the personality foundations of aggression typically implicates either (a) aspects of the so-called "Dark Tetrad" or (b) severe mental disturbance (psychosis). The appearance of psychotic symptoms in general populations is termed schizotypy. We conducted two studies to compare the effects of dark personalities and schizotypy on aggression.

Extracting Agency and Communion From the Big Five: A Four-Way Competition.

Agency and communion are the two fundamental content dimensions in psychology. The two dimensions figure prominently in many psychological realms (personality, social, self, motivational, cross-cultural, etc.).

Examining the Short Dark Tetrad (SD4) Across Models, Correlates, and Gender.

To date, no studies have examined a range of structural models of the interpersonally aversive traits tapped by the Short Dark Tetrad (SD4; narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, sadism), in conjunction with their measurement invariance (males vs. females) and how the models each predict external correlates. Using a large sample of young adults ( = 3,975), four latent variable models were compared in terms of fit, measurement invariance, and prediction of intrapersonal and interpersonal functioning.

Internet trolling and everyday sadism: Parallel effects on pain perception and moral judgment.

Objective: This research seeks to clarify the association between online trolling and sadistic personality, and to provide evidence that the reward and rationalization processes at work in sadism are likewise manifest in online trolling.

Method: Online respondents (community adults and university students; total N = 1,715) completed self-report measures of personality and trolling behavior. They subsequently engaged in one of two judgment tasks.

Aggression as a trait: the Dark Tetrad alternative.

Aggression is often construed as a unitary trait fully captured by the Buss-Perry Aggression Questionnaire (BPAQ). Our review of the literature questions that assumption in several respects. Instead of a top-down approach, we argue for a bottom-up conception based on the Dark Tetrad of personality, that is, narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, and sadism.

Elucidating the Dark Side of Envy: Distinctive Links of Benign and Malicious Envy With Dark Personalities.

Researchers have recently drawn a contrast between two forms of envy: benign and malicious envy. In three studies (total N = 3,123), we challenge the assumption that malicious envy is destructive, whereas benign envy is entirely constructive. Instead, both forms have links with the Dark Triad of personality.

Teasing Apart Overclaiming, Overconfidence, and Socially Desirable Responding.

Contamination with positivity bias is a potential problem in virtually all areas of psychological assessment. To determine the impact of positivity bias, one common approach is to embed special indicators within one's assessment battery. Such tools range from social desirability scales to overconfidence measures to the so-called overclaiming technique.

Duplicity among the dark triad: Three faces of deceit.

Although all 3 of the Dark Triad members are predisposed to engage in exploitative interpersonal behavior, their motivations and tactics vary. Here we explore their distinctive dynamics with 5 behavioral studies of dishonesty (total N = 1,750). All 3 traits predicted cheating on a coin-flipping task when there was little risk of being caught (Study 1).

The Bidimensional Impression Management Index (BIMI): measuring agentic and communal forms of impression management.

Measures of impression management have yet to incorporate two-factor models of person perception. The 2 primary factors are often labeled agency and communion. In Study 1, we assembled a new measure of impression management—the Bidimensional Impression Management Index (BIMI): It comprises 2 subscales designed specifically to tap agentic and communal content.

Introducing the short Dark Triad (SD3): a brief measure of dark personality traits.

Three socially aversive traits-Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy-have been studied as an overlapping constellation known as the Dark Triad. Here, we develop and validate the Short Dark Triad (SD3), a brief proxy measure. Four studies (total N = 1,063) examined the structure, reliability, and validity of the subscales in both community and student samples.

Behavioral confirmation of everyday sadism.

Past research on socially aversive personalities has focused on subclinical psychopathy, subclinical narcissism, and Machiavellianism-the "Dark Triad" of personality. In the research reported here, we evaluated whether an everyday form of sadism should be added to that list. Acts of apparent cruelty were captured using two laboratory procedures, and we showed that such behavior could be predicted with two measures of sadistic personality.

Worldview implications of believing in free will and/or determinism: politics, morality, and punitiveness.

Objective: We used the FAD-Plus to investigate the association of free will belief (FWB) with political orientation, moral attitudes, and punitiveness. Other goals included (a) confirming the independence of believing in free will and determinism and (b) contrasting scientific determinism with fatalistic determinism.

Method: Three studies were conducted via online questionnaires.

The role of emotional promiscuity in unprotected sex.

Sexual promiscuity is a known risk factor for unprotected sex. A related variable, emotional promiscuity, has conceptual relevance but has yet to be studied with respect to unprotected sex. Data from four studies (total N = 908) indicated that both sexual promiscuity and emotional promiscuity were associated with womens' reports of unprotected sex.

Agentic and communal values: their scope and measurement.

Agency is the meta-concept associated with self-advancement in social hierarchies; communion is the partner concept associated with maintenance of positive relationships. Despite the wealth of data documenting the conceptual utility of agency and communion (A & C) as superordinate metaconcepts, no direct measures of global A & C value dimensions are currently available. The first part of this article presents structural analyses of data from 4 diverse data sets (3 archival and 1 new): Each included a broad inventory of values or life goals.

The FAD-Plus: measuring lay beliefs regarding free will and related constructs.

We describe the development of FAD-Plus, a 27-item measure of lay beliefs in free will and 3 closely related constructs: scientific determinism, fatalistic determinism, and unpredictability. Previously published measures included only a subset of these variables and tended to assume an a priori pattern of relations among these 4 beliefs. In Study 1, exploratory factor analyses suggested relatively independent factors.

Identifying and profiling scholastic cheaters: their personality, cognitive ability, and motivation.

Despite much research, skepticism remains over the possibility of profiling scholastic cheaters. However, several relevant predictor variables and newer diagnostic tools have been overlooked. We remedy this deficit with a series of three studies.

Capturing the four-factor structure of psychopathy in college students via self-report.

A number of self-report psychopathy scales have been used successfully in both clinical and nonclinical settings. However, their factor structure does not adequately capture the four factors (Interpersonal, Affective, Lifestyle, and Antisocial) recently identified in the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; Hare, 2003) and related measures. This deficit was addressed by upgrading the Self Report Psychopathy Scale (SRP-II; Hare, Hemphill, & Harpur, 1989).

Two Replicable Suppressor Situations in Personality Research.

Suppressor situations occur when the simultaneous inclusion of two predictors improves one or both validities. A common allegation is that suppressor effects rarely replicate and have little substantive import. We present substantive examples from two established research domains to counter this skepticism.

The over-claiming technique: measuring self-enhancement independent of ability.

Over-claiming is a concrete operalization of self-enhancement based on respondents' ratings of their knowledge of various persons, events, products, and so on. Because 20% of the items are nonexistent, responses can be analyzed with signal detection formulas to index both response bias (over-claiming) and accuracy (knowledge). Study 1 demonstrated convergence of over-claiming with alternative measures of self-enhancement but independence from cognitive ability.