Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Personality and Individual Differences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid The relationship between the Dark Tetrad and a two-dimensional view of empathy Marija Pajevic c, ⁎ , Tatjana Vukosavljevic-Gvozden a , Nikola Stevanovic a , Craig S. Neumann b a Department of Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, Cika Ljubina 18-20, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia b Psychology, University of North Texas, 1155 Union Circle #311280, Denton, TX, US c Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Dark Tetrad Psychopathy Machiavellianism Narcissism Sadism Empathy ABSTRACT Although a disturbance in empathy has been related to all personality traits comprising the Dark Tetrad (i.e. Machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy, sadism), the relationship between different aspects of empathy and these dark traits measured jointly has not been empirically scrutinised. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to examine the associations between the Dark Tetrad, the two-dimensional (cognitive vs affective) model of empathy, and the ability to recognize emotions. Participants (N = 576; 250 males) for this online study were recruited using the snowball sampling method via social networking sites. Results revealed that all personality traits were inversely related to both affective and cognitive empathy, except for a positive correlation between narcissism and cognitive empathy. The regression analyses showed that the unique aspects of the Dark Triad negatively predicted affective empathy, whereas only Machiavellianism (negatively) and narcissism (positively) predicted cognitive empathy. Although both psychopathy and sadism were inversely correlated with the per- formance in the emotion recognition task, only sadism remained as a significant negative predictor once the shared variance was accounted for. The findings established different empathic profiles of each dark trait, thus supporting the construct of the Dark Tetrad as a set of overlapping, yet distinctive traits. 1. Introduction A pivotal study by Paulhus and Williams (2002) has brought con- siderable attention to the Dark Triad: a subclinical constellation of so- cially aversive personality traits consisting of Machiavellianism, psy- chopathy, and narcissism. Since the publication there has been an abundance of research showing that these personalities represent si- milar and overlapping, but still distinct constructs with unique features (Furnham, Richards, & Paulhus, 2013). This set of malevolent traits was subsequently expanded into the Dark Tetrad by including a subclinical sadism (Chabrol, Van Leeuwen, Rodgers, & Séjourné, 2009), which has proven to be a distinct construct closely linked to the Dark Triad (Međedović & Petrović, 2015; Plouffe, Saklofske, & Smith, 2017). Psychopathy is characterized by affective deficits, manipulative interpersonal style, overt antisocial behaviour, and impulsivity (Hare & Neumann, 2008), which differs from other dark members in terms of impulsive antisocial behaviour (Jones & Figueredo, 2013). Machia- vellianism includes cynical worldview, manipulativeness, amorality, callousness, and strategic-calculating behaviour, with the latter being its unique quality (Jones & Paulhus, 2014). Narcissism features grandiosity, sense of entitlement, and exploitative interpersonal style, and is distinguished from the other dark personalities by a self-pro- moting behaviour driven by a need for ego-reinforcement (Jones & Paulhus, 2014). Finally, sadism applies to a person characterized by a cruel and vicious behaviour, who deliberately humiliates and hurts others in order to assert dominance or just for the pure pleasure of it (O'Meara, Davies, & Hammond, 2011). A lack of empathy has been suggested as one of the essential fea- tures all four dark personalities have in common (Paulhus, 2014). In- deed, research confirmed the link between low empathy and the core of the Dark Tetrad, as it accounted for about two thirds of the variance in the Tetrad variables (Book et al., 2016). However, empathy represents a complex construct which involves both understanding and sharing of another's emotional state, and can be therefore divided into two types. Affective empathy refers to an observer's concordant emotional re- sponse to the affective state of another, whereas cognitive empathy involves understanding the feelings of others (including by means of perspective-taking) and inferring their mental state (Baron-Cohen & Wheelwright, 2004; Cohen & Strayer, 1996). Despite the importance of disturbed empathy as one of the core features of the Dark Tetrad, no https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2017.11.009 Received 28 July 2017; Received in revised form 5 November 2017; Accepted 7 November 2017 ⁎ Corresponding author at: Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge, Sidgwick Avenue, Cambridge CB3 9DA, UK. E-mail address: mp800@cam.ac.uk (M. Pajevic). Personality and Individual Differences 123 (2018) 125–130 0191-8869/ © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. MARK