Psychologists at Nottingham Trent University identified a new personality type that has dark traits but also with above-average empathic abilities, which they called “dark empaths.”
The study, published in Personality and Individual Differenceshighlights that contrary to what was believed, some people can have high levels of psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism, collectively called the “dark triad,” as well as empathy.
Empathy can refer to the ability to share feelings, that is, affective empathy: if you are sad, I feel sad too and it is also the ability to understand other people’s minds, called cognitive empathy: I know what you think and therefore what you feel a certain way.
Researchers tested nearly 1,000 people, who completed assessments on the dark triad and empathy. They then performed latent profile analysis that allows you to establish groups of people with different profiles of certain combinations of traits.
The results showed that 13% of the sample had low empathy scores, being a traditional dark triad group; 34% of the sample rated as typical, with low to average levels in all traits; and 33% with low dark traits and high levels of empathy, called empaths
Furthermore, it was identified a fourth group of people, the “dark empaths”, with higher scores on both dark traits and empathy, 20% of the sample.
The latter group scored higher on both cognitive and affective empathy than the “dark triad” and “typical” groups.
They found that dark empaths were not as aggressive as the traditional dark triad group, suggesting that the latter are probably more dangerous; but they were more aggressive than the typical and empathetic ones.
So, although the presence of empathy limited their level of aggressiveness, it did not eliminate it completely. In the same way, they were more extroverted than the rest.
“Although the aggression reported by dark empaths was not as high as that of the traditional dark triad group, the danger of this personality profile is that their empathy, and probably the resulting social skills, make their darkness more difficult to deal with.” detect»
So, How can you identify a dark empath?
1.- They are social and pleasant on the surface: They are more outgoing and agreeable than typical narcissists, but also more neurotic. Which may reflect sub-traits such as anger, hostility or doubts that contrast with your charisma.
2.-Malicious sense of humor: Pay attention to what they joke about and what they laugh at. They promote “guilt induction” with their jokes, to make people feel guilty and do something they want. This is emotional manipulation by default.
3.- They are narcissistic and antagonistic: Although dark empaths are not fully narcissistic, they do possess narcissistic traits, such as vanity, grandiosity, arrogance, manipulation, and need for admiration. They are less aggressive than their dark triad counterparts who lack empathy, but still harbor some antagonism in their ways.
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