People with “dark” personality traits see the world as fundamentally meaningless

A set of four studies of German-speaking adults found that individuals with a more pronounced Dark Core of personality tended to hold more pessimistic worldviews. In other words, these individuals tended to view the world as less pleasurable, less stable, less regenerative, and less meaningful. The paper was published in the Journal of Personality.

The Dark Core of personality is a general underlying tendency that unites various socially aversive personality traits. It was proposed to explain why traits such as narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, everyday sadism, and spitefulness tend to correlate with one another. The concept suggests that these traits share a common dispositional core rather than being entirely separate characteristics.

This core has been described as a general tendency to maximize one’s own benefit while disregarding or accepting harm to others. Individuals high on the Dark Core are more likely to justify unethical behavior if it serves their interests. The concept builds on earlier ideas like the “Dark Triad,” which focused on three related traits, by suggesting an even broader common factor. As such, the Dark Core helps explain why different forms of manipulative, exploitative, or callous behavior tend to occur together in the same individual.

Study authors Robin Schrödter and Benjamin E. Hilbig wanted to investigate whether the Dark Core of personality is associated with more negative primal world beliefs. Primal world beliefs are basic, deeply held assumptions people have about the overall nature of the world, such as whether it is safe or dangerous, good or bad, abundant or scarce. The study authors wanted to examine whether the negativity common among individuals high in the Dark Core is limited to beliefs that justify abusive behaviors or reflects a broader view of the world as fundamentally bleak.

They conducted 4 studies involving between 400 and 640 participants per study. Across studies, the average age of participants ranged between 34 and 40 years of age. There were somewhat more men than women in each of the 4 samples. Over 85% of participants in each of the four studies were residents of Germany. The remaining participants came from Namibia, Austria, and Switzerland. There was a small share of participants from other countries as well.

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The four studies differed in the assessments they used. Two studies administered a 16-item measure of the Dark Core, while the other two studies administered a 70-item measure (e.g. “I’ll say anything to get what I want.” or “I cannot imagine how being mean to others could ever be exciting”), though the researchers analyzed a consistent 16-item subset across all four studies to maximize consistency. The first study used a short 18-item measure of primal world beliefs (the Primal Inventory, German version), while the remaining three studies used longer forms of primal world belief assessments, each focusing on a different specific primal belief dimension (“Alive,” “Safe,” and “Enticing”).

Results showed that, in general, individuals with a more pronounced Dark Core of personality tended to hold more negative primal world beliefs specifically regarding whether the world is safe and enticing. For example, they tended to see the world as less abundant, beautiful, improvable, interesting, meaningful, or worth exploring. They also tended to see the world as less cooperative, less harmless, less just, less pleasurable, less progressive, less regenerative, and less stable.

However, the researchers found a different pattern regarding the “Alive” dimension—the belief that the universe operates with purpose or intentionality. The Dark Core showed no meaningful association with this dimension overall. Yet, there was a small positive link with the “Interactive” facet, indicating that individuals high in dark traits are slightly more likely to believe that the universe or a higher power is actively involved in their personal lives or communicating with them.

The authors suggest this isolated belief does not necessarily mean they view the world positively, but rather aligns with the grandiose, narcissistic self-views often found in individuals with aversive personalities.

“Specifically, the facet Meaningful emerged as uniquely associated with D [the Dark Core], suggesting that perceiving many aspects of life as meaningless reflects a broader worldview underlying D—one that extends beyond specific beliefs used to justify aversive behavior,” the study authors concluded.

The study contributes to the scientific understanding of the psychological underpinnings of the Dark Core of personality. However, it should be noted that the cross-sectional, correlational design of these studies does not allow any causal inferences to be derived from the results.

The paper, “Seeing the World Through a Dark Lens: The Dark Core of Personality and Its Relation to Primal World Beliefs,” was authored by Robin Schrödter and Benjamin E. Hilbig.