Development and validation of the super-short form of the Elemental Psychopathy Assessment Katherine L. Collison a , Joshua D. Miller b , Eric T. Gaughan c , Thomas A. Widiger d , Donald R. Lynam a, ⁎ a Purdue University, Department of Psychological Sciences, 703 Third Street, West Lafayette, IN 47907-2081, USA b University of Georgia, Department of Psychology, 125 Baldwin St, Athens, GA 30602, USA c University of Georgia, Department of Psychology, 4400 College Boulevard, Suite 190, Overland Park, KS 66211, USA d University of Kentucky, Department of Psychology, 106-B Kastle Hall, Lexington, KY 40506, USA abstract article info Article history: Received 17 September 2016 Accepted 17 September 2016 Available online xxxx Purpose: Current measures of psychopathy are limited in a number of ways, including length, administration methods, and reliance on history of antisocial behavior. Both the full and short forms of the Elemental Psychop- athy Assessment (EPA) have demonstrated convergent validity and strong relations to other psychopathy mea- sures and external criteria empirically associated with psychopathy. Methods: In order to create an even briefer version of the EPA-SF, the EPA was administered to two separate un- dergraduate samples (n = 907 and n = 787) and a smaller sample of male prison inmates (n = 77) along with widely used measures of psychopathy and measures of Big Five personality traits and antisocial behavior. Results: Eighteen items (one per EPA subscale) were chosen to comprise the final “super-short” form. Exploratory factor analyses performed at the item level showed a three-factor solution (Antagonism, Disinhibition, and Emo- tional Stability). The factor scales and total score of the EPA super-short form demonstrated strong relations to other psychopathy measures and external criteria associated with psychopathy. Conclusions: The EPA super-short form could be a promising alternative to other psychopathy measures currently used in criminology due to its brevity and basis in an empirically validated personality model. © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Psychopathy Assessment Personality Five-factor model Antagonism 1. Introduction Psychopathy is a complex personality construct with a long history in personality and clinical psychology (Cleckley, 1941), characterized by dysfunction in a number of areas. Interpersonally, psychopaths tend to be antagonistic, dominant, and exhibit superficial charm. Affec- tively, psychopaths can be described as callous, lacking self-directed negative affect and empathy, and demonstrating negative other-direct- ed affect. Behaviorally, psychopaths tend to exhibit pan-impulsivity (Lynam et al., 2011) and a number of externalizing behaviors, including substance use (e.g., Lynam et al., 2013; Gustavson et al., 2007), aggres- sion (e.g., Walters, 2003), and sexual offending (e.g., Knight & Guay, 2006). Much of the interest in psychopathy is driven by its relatively strong relations with antisocial behaviors (e.g., Lykken, 1995; Hare & Neumann, 2008), particularly violence and criminality. The Hare Psy- chopathy Checklist (PCL; e.g., Hare, 1991; 2003) family of measures has consistently yielded moderate to large effect sizes for predicting violent recidivism among both juvenile and adult offenders (Rice & Harris, 2013), and also more accurately predicted recidivism than a widely used violence risk assessment tool, the HCR-20. Because of the strong theoretical and empirical overlap between psychopathy and criminal and antisocial behavior (e.g., Hare, 1999), psychopathy is emerging as an important construct in criminology (e.g., Polaschek & Daly, 2013). DeLisi (2009) argued that psychopathy should be considered the unified theory of crime because of its embodi- ment of the “pejorative essence of antisocial behavior” as well as its ability to accommodate both dimensional and categorical conceptuali- zations of antisocial behavior across diverse populations. DeLisi et al. (2014) argue that one possible mechanism for psychopathy's relation- ship with antisocial behavior and criminality is moral disengagement, defined as the tendency to selectively disengage from moral censure. Moral disengagement allows for an individual to engage in often self- serving behaviors that are in contrast with moral principles without feeling guilt or remorse (DeLisi et al., 2014). The callousness that charac- terizes psychopathic individuals directly relates to moral disengage- ment as it prevents the individual from emotionally relating to others, which is required to trigger self-conscious emotions such as guilt or shame. Without guilt or shame, the impetus to inhibit antisocial behav- iors is missing; for this reason, it is unsurprising that individuals with Journal of Criminal Justice 47 (2016) 143–150 ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: kcolliso@purdue.edu (K.L. Collison), jdmiller@uga.edu (J.D. Miller), eric.gaughan@gmail.com (E.T. Gaughan), widiger@email.uky.edu (T.A. Widiger), dlynam@purdue.edu (D.R. Lynam). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2016.09.002 0047-2352/© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Criminal Justice