Your psychopathy profile
A made-up example that shows what you get after the test. Take the test to get your own result.
Psychopathic traits overall
The average of your nine percentiles
You are in the typical range. Like most people you have some of these traits without them shaping how you treat others. Look at the three sides below: they usually differ more than the overall score shows.
Your profile
Bold, but not mean or impulsive
You are more fearless, dominant and risk-tolerant than most, while treating others well and keeping control of yourself. This combination is linked to leadership, calm in emergencies and heroic behaviour rather than to harm. In the triarchic model it is the adaptive face of psychopathy.
The three sides
Each side is the average of three traits. Boldness is the side that can be a strength: calm under pressure, socially confident, willing to take risks. Meanness is the cold, exploitative side. Disinhibition is the impulsive, irresponsible, rule-breaking side.
Fearless, dominant and drawn to risk
Higher than about 70 % of the comparison sample
You feel less fear than most, stand your ground and enjoy a risk. People probably see you as confident and hard to rattle. Watch that the calm does not turn into underestimating real dangers.
Boldness is calm under threat, social confidence and a taste for danger. It is the side of psychopathy that can be an asset: bold people make good first responders, leaders and performers. On its own it does little harm.
The traits behind it
- Risk-takingHigher than about 91 % of the comparison sample
Seeking danger and adrenaline
- FearlessnessHigher than about 91 % of the comparison sample
Little anxiety, worry or nervousness
- DominanceHigher than about 28 % of the comparison sample
Not letting others run your life
Cold, exploitative and hostile
Higher than about 49 % of the comparison sample
You are in the typical range: you can be tough or self-serving at times, like most people, but you are not indifferent to others.
Meanness is a lack of warmth: indifference to others' feelings, willingness to use or deceive them, and a readiness to hurt or get even. It is the side of psychopathy that damages relationships and that other people fear.
The traits behind it
- CallousnessHigher than about 36 % of the comparison sample
Indifference to how others feel
- ManipulativenessHigher than about 69 % of the comparison sample
Using and deceiving others for your own gain
- HostilityHigher than about 42 % of the comparison sample
Getting even, hurting and fighting
Impulsive, irresponsible and rule-breaking
Higher than about 52 % of the comparison sample
You are about as impulsive as most people: you can act on a whim, but you generally keep your commitments and stay out of trouble.
Disinhibition is poor self-control: acting without planning, letting duties slide and breaking rules. It is the side of psychopathy that leads to trouble with work, money and the law, and it overlaps with impulsivity more broadly.
The traits behind it
- ImpulsivityHigher than about 57 % of the comparison sample
Acting without planning or thinking it through
- IrresponsibilityHigher than about 39 % of the comparison sample
Letting duties and promises slide
- Rule-breakingHigher than about 61 % of the comparison sample
Trouble with rules, authority and the law
A high score does not make you a psychopath. Psychopathy as clinicians use the word is assessed with a structured interview and records, not a questionnaire, and it is rare. These scales measure normal variation in personality; the scales in the comparison sample were developed to study personality disorders, which is why most people score low on the meanness side.
The three sides follow Patrick's triarchic model, but the statements are public-domain CAT-PD scales from the International Personality Item Pool, not the Triarchic Psychopathy Measure. The grouping is our own.
The comparison sample is university students in New Zealand (Sellbom and colleagues, 2024). Percentiles are estimated from the sample's averages and spread. Most people score low on the meanness traits, so the percentiles there are rough.
See the whole dark side
Psychopathy is one of the four dark traits. The dark personality test also measures Machiavellianism, narcissism and sadism, and the narcissism test goes deeper into one of them.
Take the dark personality test