A Comprehensive and Person-Centered View of the Association Between the Dark Triad and Youth Mental Health

Abstract

Using a dual person-centered approach, the current study examined the Dark Triad profiles and mental health profiles among a large-scale sample of high school students. The study also simultaneously examined whether the emerging Dark Triad profiles could diverge in mental health profiles, delineating a thorough, and person-centered view of this association. To achieve these research aims, 1,640 Chinese high school students (Mage = 16.78; SD = 0.68; 57.6% females) participated in this study, and they were uniformly instructed to complete a set of well-established questionnaires. Results from latent profile analyses revealed five Dark Triad profiles—low Machiavellianism-psychopathy (7.4%), benevolent (61.7%), highly malevolent (6.7%), low narcissism (8.8%), and malevolent (15.4%)—and the following four mental health profiles: flourishing (37.7%), vulnerable (16.4%), troubled (33.9%), and highly troubled (12.4%). Moreover, results from multiple multinomial regression analyses showed that, among all five empirically derived Dark Triad profiles, students with the low Machiavellianism-psychopathy profile exhibited the highest probability of being “flourishing,” whereas those with the low narcissism profile showed the highest likelihood of being “highly troubled.”

Peer Relationship Profiles among Early Adolescents from Low-Income Families: The Unique and Combined Effects of Attachment to Mothers and Conscientiousness

“…Further, past research has relied predominantly on a traditional variable-centered approach (e.g., correlations, regressions, and path analyses), generating a limited scope of adolescents' social adjustment. Such an approach often assumes homogeneity in the population, obscuring the fact that multiple aspects of peer relationships do not operate independently but rather as part of an integrated system within the individuals [16][17][18]. In response to this methodological limitation, the present research used a person-centered approach (i.e., a latent profile analysis) to identify peer relationship profiles, in which we classified adolescents based on similar values on different indicators of peer relationships (e.g., peer acceptance and friendships).…”

Machiavellianism and learning-related subjective well-being among Chinese senior high school students: A moderated mediation model

“…And Machiavellianism is not only positively correlated with depression and perfectionism ( Sherry et al, 2006 ; Bianchi and Mirkovic, 2020 ), but also negatively affects individuals’ life satisfaction, subjective well-being ( Sherry et al, 2006 ), and motivation for happiness ( Cai et al, 2017 ). There is also an empirical study indicating that among all five empirically derived Dark Triad profiles, students with the low Machiavellianism profile exhibited the highest probability of “flourishing” ( Hu and Lan, 2022 ). Furthermore, according to life history theory (LHT; Figueredo et al, 2006 ), which is a mid-level theory from evolutionary biology, individuals must make a balance between survival efforts and reproduction efforts to adapt to the environment.…”