New research reveals that people with highly manipulative personalities hold lower expectations for emotional closeness in their romantic relationships, with older women showing the strongest negative association. But the findings suggest that existing views on love and attachment habits shape connection more heavily than negative personality traits alone. The research was published in Personality and Individual Differences.
Developing deep intimacy is widely considered a cornerstone of psychological well-being. A supportive and trusting romantic relationship can provide a psychological buffer against life stressors and improve overall mental health. When individuals struggle to form these bonds, they often experience higher rates of loneliness and ongoing emotional distress.
Psychologists identify three socially antagonistic personality profiles collectively called the Dark Triad. Narcissism involves grandiosity, entitlement, and an excessive need for admiration. Psychopathy is characterized by a lack of remorse, impulsive behavior, and emotional coldness. Machiavellianism describes a cynical worldview and a manipulative, strategic approach to interacting with others.
People who score high on these traits often experience relationship difficulties. Past research links these tendencies to infidelity, low commitment, and a tendency to view romance as a game. Less focus has been placed on what these individuals actually anticipate from a partner regarding mutual sharing and emotional trust.
Intimacy goes beyond physical affection. Psychologists define intimate expectations as the anticipation of mutual self-disclosure, deep trust, and a shared sense of understanding. People who score high in intimacy expectations look for a partner who will validate their innermost feelings. Those with low expectations prefer to keep their personal thoughts hidden.
These standards are heavily influenced by a person’s underlying attachment style. Attachment theory was originally developed to describe how infants bond with their caregivers. Psychologists have since adapted this framework to understand how adult romantic partners relate to one another.
Attachment styles are generally divided into secure and insecure categories. People with a secure attachment style feel comfortable with intimacy and are usually warm and loving. Insecure attachment styles, which include anxious and avoidant patterns, tend to create psychological barriers to experiencing a deeply fulfilled romantic life.
The psychological theory proposes that early social experiences create broad mental rules about whether people can be trusted. Individuals with an avoidant attachment style attempt to minimize vulnerability by keeping emotional distance. They often downplay the importance of having a responsive partner.
Those with an anxious attachment style frequently worry about abandonment and remain highly sensitive to rejection. Beliefs about romance also influence how much closeness someone desires. Some people hold highly idealized views of love, believing in concepts like true love or soulmates. These romantic ideals shape how people evaluate the potential for intimacy in their own partnerships.
Researchers Silvija Ručević and Josipa Antunović at the Josip Juraj Strossmayer University of Osijek in Croatia set out to understand how these factors relate to one another. They wanted to evaluate whether Dark Triad profiles, attachment habits, or idealized romantic beliefs were the primary drivers of relationship expectations. They also looked at whether demographic factors like age or gender shifted these emotional patterns.
To investigate this, Ručević and Antunović surveyed 900 adults aged 18 to 74 who were currently in a romantic relationship. The sample was predominantly heterosexual and included a mix of married and dating couples. The participants completed a series of questionnaires designed to measure their levels of Dark Triad traits.
Participants responded to statements such as “I tend to manipulate others” to gauge Machiavellian tendencies. They also answered questions about their relationship anxiety, emotional avoidance, and beliefs regarding idealized romance. Finally, the researchers measured what each participant expected regarding emotional closeness and trust using a standardized intimacy scale.
The researchers analyzed the data using statistical models to see which traits and beliefs carried the most weight. They utilized a layered approach, adding variables step by step to determine which factors uniquely predicted a person’s expectations for intimacy. This layered statistical process is known as hierarchical regression.
Hierarchical regression allows researchers to see whether a newly added variable explains anything fresh about the data. By feeding age and gender into the model first, the scientists ensured that any subsequent findings about personality were not just illusions created by demographic differences. Subsequent steps introduced the personality traits, followed by the relational beliefs and attachment habits.
The results showed that general relational habits were the strongest predictors of intimacy expectations. Avoidant attachment strongly predicted a desire for less emotional closeness. In contrast, holding highly idealized romantic beliefs was the strongest predictor of expecting high levels of intimacy.
When looking specifically at the Dark Triad, the researchers found divergent effects among the three distinct traits. Machiavellianism emerged as the strongest personality predictor of low intimacy expectations. It appears that people who view social interactions as strategic endeavors are less likely to anticipate mutual trust in romance.
Narcissism displayed a slightly different pattern during the analysis. When standing alone as a single data point, narcissism had a small negative association with intimacy expectations. Once the researchers statistically removed the manipulative tendencies of Machiavellianism, narcissism weakly predicted an increase in intimacy expectations.
This statistical phenomenon is known as a suppression effect. The researchers suggest that the need for validation and approval associated with narcissism might drive a basic desire for closeness. Narcissistic individuals may still want admiration and connection, even if that interpersonal desire remains largely self-centered.
Psychopathy did not uniquely predict intimacy expectations once the other personality variables were included in the model. While psychopathy is linked to harmful behavioral outcomes like infidelity, it might not heavily impact the cognitive ideas people hold about closeness. The way individuals act in romantic relationships might simply differ from what they conceptualize in their minds.
The researchers also conducted moderation analyses to see if age or gender changed the mathematical relationships. They found that demographics influenced the connection between Machiavellianism and intimacy expectations. The negative association between manipulative traits and a desire for closeness grew much stronger in older women.
Older women with high levels of Machiavellianism reported the lowest intimacy expectations of any demographic group in the study. Younger women and men of all ages showed a relatively steady pattern. For these groups, a high Machiavellian score predicted lower intimacy expectations, but the effect remained consistent regardless of changing age.
The researchers note that women with high Machiavellianism might develop increasingly pragmatic and emotionally distant views of relationships over time. This psychological distancing could be compounded if they consistently select partners with similar antagonistic traits. Narcissism and psychopathy did not show this age or gender moderation, remaining stable across all demographic groupings.
While the results offer a nuanced look at relationship dynamics, the study has limitations. The research relied entirely on self-reported surveys. This method can introduce psychological bias, as participants might not always answer honestly about socially undesirable motives or actions.
The study also used a cross-sectional design, meaning the data was collected at a single static point in time. Because the data is observational, it cannot prove that these personality traits cause a specific set of intimacy expectations. Longitudinal studies tracking couples over years would be needed to establish how these mental frameworks evolve.
The researchers point out that their non-clinical community sample resulted in relatively low overall scores for the socially antagonistic traits. The statistical effects, while observable, were modest in mathematical size. This indicates that intimacy is a multifaceted concept shaped by a wide variety of personal and environmental factors.
Understanding the roots of low intimacy expectations can help psychologists develop better relationship therapies. If a counselor knows a patient views relationships strictly as strategic alliances, they can tailor their therapy sessions accordingly. Addressing these underlying cognitive frameworks is often necessary before attempting to change outward romantic behaviors.
Future research could explore how cultural backgrounds or specific partner interactions alter these internal relationship maps. Intimacy expectations might be shaped by broader societal norms just as much as individual psychology. By integrating cognitive beliefs and personality analysis, researchers can better map out why some individuals struggle to build healthy romantic bonds.
The study, “Behind the mask of love: Associations among dark triad traits, attachment avoidance and anxiety, romantic beliefs, and intimacy expectations,” was authored by Silvija Ručević and Josipa Antunović.
