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MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD

Mate Poaching and the Dark Triad
Nicholas P. Deems
The Ohio State University at Mansfield

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MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD

Table of Contents
Abstract………………………………………………………………………….3
Introduction……………………………………………………………………...4
Method…………………………………………………………………………..11
Results…………………………………………………………………………..14
Discussion………………………………………………………………………18
Conclusion………………………………………………………………………21
References……………………………………………………………………….22
Tables……………………………………………………………………………26

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MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD

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Abstract
The Dark Triad is a collective term used to describe the malevolent personality dimensions of
narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. These constructs of the Dark Triad have been
associated with many undesirable behaviors such as the exploitation of others for personal gain.
This study investigated the Dark Triad in the context of mate poaching—the act of stealing amate away from an already established, and presumably, monogamous relationship. Past
research has correlated the constructs of the Dark Triad with self-reported acts of mate poaching,but this is the first study to assess mate poaching in relation to the Dark Triad using quasiexperimental methodology. College students (N = 142) participated in what they believed to be atest of a new dating service geared towards college students. Students filled out personality
questionnaires that measured Dark Triad traits. Afterwards, they were ostensibly matched with
an opposite-sex target whom they were led to believe was a student on campus who sharedsimilar personality traits. The target's image and profile were held constant with the exceptionthat the relationship status was randomly assigned to be either single or in a relationship. The
results indicated that only the construct of psychopathy was related to mate poaching. This effectwas only found for those individuals who also reported being in a relationship. For the otherconstructs, no desire to mate poach was detected. This is contrasted with self-report studies thathave indicated that those high in dimensions of the Dark Triad report engaging in mate poaching.

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD

4Mate Poaching and the Dark Triad
The Dark Triad
The Dark Triad is comprised of three closely related, but unique constructs (Paulhus &Williams, 2002) –grandiose narcissism, Machiavellianism, and subclinical psychopathy.
Narcissism, specifically grandiose narcissism, entails an exaggerated sense of agency, high selfesteem, entitlement, willingness to exploit others, and high levels of exhibitionism (Raskin &Hall, 1979; Brunell & Campbell, 2011). Machiavellianism is characterized by duplicity, a lack of
empathy, and a “do whatever it takes to get ahead” mentality (Christie & Geis, 1970).
Psychopathy comprises attributes of impulsivity, thrill seeking, low empathy, and low levels ofanxiety (Paulhus & Williams, 2002). These traits have been associated with malevolent,
impulsive, and self-centered behavior, which in turn has been linked to poor societal andpersonal outcomes (Paulhus & Williams, 2002; Jonason, Li & Buss, 2010). Some scholars (e.g.,Levenson, Kiehl, & Fitzpatrick, 1995) distinguish between two forms of psychopathy: Primary
psychopathy and secondary psychopathy. Primary psychopathy is related to the emotional
coldness, exploitativeness, and a lack of empathy associated with psychopathic individuals.
Secondary psychopathy captures the risk-taking, impulsivity, and poor decision making aspectsof psychopathy.
Due to collective underpinning characteristics, such as low or nonexistent empathy(Jonason, Lyons, Bethell, & Ross, 2012), disagreeableness (Paulhus & Williams, 2002), and awillingness to exploit others for personal gain (Jonason, Li, Webster, & Schmitt, 2009), theconstructs of the Dark Triad have been shown to be toxic in the workplace. Employees who

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
5score higher in the three dimensions of the Dark Triad have self-reported to using hard tactics,
such as force, aggression, threats, and manipulation in the work environment more so thanemployees with lower scores on measures of these constructs (Jonason, Slomski, & Partyka,2011). At least one construct—psychopathy—has been associated with having “dark hobbies”
coalesced around violence (James, Kavanagh, Jonason, Chonody & Scrutton, 2014). This
coincides with other research that has implicated psychopathy as a reliable predictor forincreased aggression in response to a physical provocation, whereas narcissists tend to be moreaggressive in response to an ego-threat (Jones & Paulhus, 2010).
Ironically, these same traits that typically result in poor outcomes can also prove to beadvantageous. For example, narcissism and psychopathy have been linked to higher levels of
extraversion, meaning these individuals appear to be more outgoing and personable (Paulhus &Williams, 2002). In the short term, narcissists appear to have desirable leadership qualities, suchas confidence, dominance, and competitiveness, which often help them emerge to leadership
positions (Brunell et al., 2008; Rauthmann & Kolar, 2012). Another possible adaptive outcome
for individuals high in the dimensions of the Dark Triad is the number of short-term mates theytend to acquire, thus improving their reproductive fitness. This is not that surprising considering
they tend to be socially charming and physically attractive (Holtzman & Strube, 2012). Theseseemingly admirable traits mask their arsenal of exploitive mating strategies employed to acquire
short-term mates (Jonason et al., 2009). This study investigates one exploitive mating strategy
called mate poaching.

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD

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Mate Poaching
Mate poaching is an attempt to steal away the romantic partner from his/her alreadyestablished, and presumably, monogamous relationship. Mate poaching involves three parties:
the poacher—the one who attempted to steal the mate away; the poached—the mate who wasstolen away, and the poachee—the partner left behind (Buss & Schmitt, 2001). Mate poachingseems to be a relatively frequent strategy (Buss & Schmitt, 2001) that has been documented
around the world (Schmitt, 2004). Mate poaching can be used as a short-term strategy or as along-term strategy. Short-term strategies would involve the poacher wooing the poached awayfrom his/her current partner for a one-night stand (i.e., a hookup). Used as a long-term strategy,
the poacher attempts to establish a new relationship with the poached or establish a “friendswith-benefits” relationship. Both strategies require time, energy, and resources. The poacher also
runs the risk of retaliation from the partner who lost his/her mate (Davies & Shackelford, 2007).
With such high stakes, a reasonable question to ask is why anyone would pursue this tactic? It
would stand to reason that most individuals would choose the path of least resistance and pursue
a single mate. One possible explanation and advantage of mate poaching is that individuals who
use this strategy open their number of potential mates to include not only single targets but
targets that are considered “off-the-market.”Another idea is that mate poachers may view taken mates as being qualitatively better
than single mates. To test this, Parker and Burkley (2009) ostensibly matched participants to an
opposite sex target and told the participant that the target was either single or in a relationship.
Next, participants were asked to answer questions that gauged how likely they would be tointeract with the individual with whom they were matched. Results found that although men

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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rated female targets as more attractive than women rated male targets, women found the target ina relationship to be significantly more attractive than the single male target. Parker and Burkley
postulated that this may be attributed to women following the notion of their peers and assuming
a man in a committed relationship clearly has something of “value” if he has already been taken.
These findings may provide a useful explanation for why both genders might engage in matepoaching: they perceive a taken mate as being qualitatively better than a single mate.
Only one study has assessed a possible link between the Dark Triad and mate poaching.
Jonason, Li, and Buss (2010) revealed that those high in all three constructs of the Dark Triad, on
average, reported having more partners, poaching more mates, being poached away fromexisting relationships, and having had more mates poached away from them than those whoscored lower on the Dark Triad. Although these findings are interesting, the data was derived
through self-report and causation cannot be inferred.
To examine the extent to which narcissists preferred a target who was already in a
relationship to one who was single, Brunell, Robinson, Okdie and Deems (2015) conducted aquasi-experiment. They borrowed the paradigm used by Parker and Burkely (2009) to matchparticipants with another student on campus. After viewing the profile, the participant answereda series of questions which were aggregated as a measure of pursuit. The results of thisexperiment found that men were more interested in pursuing the target more than women were,
but narcissism was not a significant predictor of mate poaching. Thus, it appeared that narcissists
do not prefer mate poaching over pursuing a single person.
The Dark Triad and Mate Poaching
The correlational findings of Jonason, Li, and Buss (2010) do provide potential insight
into how each of the constructs of the Dark Trait relate to mate poaching. Both narcissism andMATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
8psychopathy were significantly correlated with self-reported acts of mate poaching and being
relatively successful in their pursuits. However, a problem with self-report is that people may
respond with bias when answering questions. For instance, Alexander and Fisher (2003) foundthat when measuring participants’ self-reported attitudes and behaviors towards sex, males
scored significantly higher when they believed someone else would see their answers. Other
researchers extended this paradigm to assess grandiose narcissism and found that participants
scoring higher on measures of grandiose narcissism self-reported higher levels of self-esteem andentitlement when they thought someone else might see their responses (Brunell & Fisher, 2014).
Further evidence suggests that narcissists tend to exaggerate their talents and achievements (John& Robbins, 1994). The implication of these studies is that narcissists, being the braggadocio
individuals that they are, may openly report that they engage in more sex and risky behaviors(Buelow & Brunell, 2014), but when it comes to committing the behavior, narcissists perform no
differently than others (e.g., Brunell & Buelow, in press). For example, grandiose narcissistic
constructs, such as grandiosity and exploitativeness, have been demonstrated to be reliablepredictors for self-reported engagement of risk-taking behaviors (Buelow & Brunell, 2014), butwhen asked to engage in risky decision making games in a laboratory setting, narcissism was notfound to be a significant predictor of risk taking (Brunell & Buelow, in press). Although
Jonason, Li, and Buss (2010) concluded that narcissists self-report higher rates of mate poaching
than non-narcissists, this effect may be driven by narcissist’s habit of answering questions in asocially desirable way; therefore, I hypothesized that narcissism would not be associated withmate poaching because of the associated risk and the additional effort that is involved.
There is research documenting Machiavellians as individuals with a likelihood to cheatand engage in mate poaching (Brewer & Abell, 2015; Brewer, Hunt, James, and Abell, 2015;

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
9Jonason, Li, & Buss, 2010). However, again, these studies relied on self-report. Interestingly,
Brewer et. al (2015) found that participants who scored higher on Machiavellianism indicated atendency to engage in infidelity in the future, but they did not report past incidents of infidelity.
This is as much interesting as it is puzzling. Why would Machiavellian individuals who areunlikely to have cheated in the past say that they would be more likely to cheat in the future?
Perhaps it is due to a willingness to cheat, but the opportunity has yet to present itself. In regards
to mate poaching, Jonason, Li, and Buss (2010) found no correlations between Machiavellianismand overall experiences of mate poaching. The constructs of narcissism and psychopathy arewhat accounted for the relationship between the Dark Triad and mate poaching—not
Machiavellianism; based on the results of the research, I hypothesized that Machiavellianism
would not be associated with mate poaching.
After a careful review of the first two components of the Dark Triad—narcissism andMachiavellianism—it seems that neither of them would be implicated in mate poaching;
however, psychopathy, shows correlational promise. Past work has associated psychopathy as aconstruct correlated with mate poaching (Jonason, Li, & Buss, 2010; Kardum, Hudek-Khezevic,
Schmitt & Grundler, 2015). Psychopathy has also been demonstrated to be a significant predictorof mate poaching attempts above and beyond gender and the other two constructs of the Dark
Triad (Kardum et al., 2015). Research using Levenson’s Self-Report Psychopathy Scaledemonstrated an association between primary psychopathy (e.g., emotional coldness andexploitativeness) and secondary psychopathy (impulsivity, risky behavior and poor decision
making), in relation to infidelity (Brewer et al., 2015). Both primary and secondary psychopathy
were correlated with past infidelity and intentions to engage in infidelity in the future (Abell etal., 2015).

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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I hypothesized that participants scoring high on either primary or secondary psychopathy,
or both, would pursue a single target and a target in a relationship, but psychopathy would be abetter predictor for pursuing the attached target than narcissism and Machiavellianism.
It should be noted that many researchers studying the Dark Triad opt for the brief
measure of the Dark Triad known as the “Dirty Dozen” (Jonason & Webster, 2010). Thismeasure has been reported as valid but some scholars have found that it does not cover the arrayof behavior that characterizes the Dark Triad (Miller et al., 2012). For this reason, I chose to rely
on reliable and valid measures for each facet of the Dark Triad.
Gender Differences, the Dark Triad, and Mate Poaching
Typically, men score higher than women on measures of the Dark Triad (Paulhus &Williams, 2002, Jonason et al., 2009), and men are the more likely of the two sexes to engage incheating (Clark & Hatfield, 1989). However, Parker and Burkley (2009) found that although men
rated female targets more attractive than women rated male targets, women found the target in a
relationship to be significantly more attractive than the single male target. In addition, high Dark
Triad scoring women have also been implicated in infidelity using the Dark Triad as a predictor
of past infidelity and intentions to engage in infidelity in the future (Brewer et al., 2015). Thesefindings further elucidate the promiscuousness, deceptiveness, and propensity to cheatcharacterized by the constructs of the Dark Triad (Jonason & Kavanagh, 2010; Brewer & Abell,2015).
Overview of the Present Study
The potential problem of the existing research is that it is mostly self-report andcorrelational. Although individuals higher in dimensions of the Dark Triad report that they havemate poach, they may behave in ways that are inconsistent with their self-reports. I hoped toMATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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extend the work done by Parker and Burkley (2009) by using their paradigm but clarifying thedifference between finding a target attractive and pursuing a target. I also sought to extend thework of Brunell and collegues (2015) by investigating the Dark Triad, and by assessing matepoaching as a short-term and long-term strategy. To my knowledge, no one has provided goldstandard experimental evidence implicating or exonerating the Dark Triad as mate poachers. The
present study would not only extend research on the relationship between the Dark Triad andmate poaching but would do so using a quasi-experimental design. Since personality traits cannot
be randomly assigned to participants, a quasi-experiment is the gold standard in personality
research.
My predictions were as follows: (1) Those possessing higher levels of narcissism would
be unlikely to indicate that they would engage in mate poaching; (2) Participants high in
Machiavellianism would not engage in mate poaching; (3) Individuals that score high in primaryand secondary psychopathy would tend to mate poach; (4) Men would find both the attachedtarget and the unattached target more attractive than women (Brunell, Robinson, Okdie &Deems, 2015; Parker & Burkely, 2009); (5) Women would find the attached target more
attractive than the single target (Parker & Burkely, 2009).
MethodParticipantsParticipants consisted of 142 undergraduate students enrolled in Introduction to
Psychology courses at a regional campus of the Ohio State University in exchange for partial
course credit. Out of these 142 students, 81 self-identified as female and 61 self-identified as
male. The average age of the students was 18.86 (SD = 2.77).

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
Measurements of the Dark Triad

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Narcissism: To assess the component of grandiose narcissism, I use the Narcissistic
Personality Inventory (Raskin & Terry, 1988). This scale consists of 40 items with twocontrasting statements in which the subject selects the statement that is most self-descriptive.
One option of an item states: “I get upset when people don’t notice how I look when I go out inpublic;” the other option to this question states: “I don’t mind blending into the crowd when I goout in public.” Narcissistic answers were scored as a 1 and non-narcissistic answers were scoredas a 0; all total scores were out of 40.
Machiavellianism: Measurements of Machiavellianism were made using the 20-item
Mach IV (Christie & Geis, 1970). With each statement participants indicate their agreement (1=strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree) with statements, such as: “the biggest difference
between criminals and other people is that criminals are stupid enough to get caught.” Thehighest score possible is 100.
Psychopathy: The 26-item psychopathy scale (Levenson, Kiehl, & Fitzpatrick, 1995) wasused to assess primary and secondary psychopathy. The first 16 questions measure theunscrupulous emotional coldness that is associated with primary psychopathy. An example ofthese questions includes “For me, what’s right is whatever I can get away with.” The remaining
10 questions capture the impulsivity characterized by secondary psychopathy: for example, “I
am often bored.” Participants would then express their agreement or disagreement on a 4-point
scale (1 = disagree strongly and 4 = agree strongly) with a score of 104 being the highest score.
Procedure
To create a naturalistic condition in a controlled setting, I used the guise of assisting adating website to collect data on a web platform geared toward college students on the Ohio

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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State University campuses. This “web platform” was simply a web page designed to look like anauthentic OSU endorsed dating webpage. Two web pages were designed to represent one female
target and one male target that were pretested as being equal in physical attractiveness. The
webpage of the targets consisted of a picture, interests (conversation, friends and family),hobbies (cooking, reading, and binge watching Netflix), and an “about me” blurb which stated,“Hi! I’ll try to describe myself without giving away too many spoilers. :) I’m a pretty outgoing
person who can get along with just about anyone, I like to surround myself with people who have
similar outlooks on life and who can make me laugh hysterically!” The demographic information
served as the primary manipulation. Along with a first name, age, hair and eye color, andoccupation as a student, a relationship status was provided. Participants were randomly assigned
for the relationship status to say “single” or “in a relationship.” In all other ways both webpagesof the targets were identical.
Following Parker and Burkley’s (2009) procedure, participants were instructed that theywould answer several questionnaires—a demographic questionnaire (e.g., sex, age, andrelationship status: single or in a relationship) and personality questionnaires, like those found on
Eharmony.com, that would measure their interests, ideals, likes, and dislikes. Participants weretold that these personality questionnaires would be used to pair them with another student on
campus who shared similar interests and ideals. Unbeknown to the participants, this last part ofthe study was rigged so that all male participants viewed the same female profile (except for the
manipulation of the target’s relationship status) and all female participants viewed the same maleprofile (except for the manipulation of the target’s relationship status). After filling out allnecessary questionnaires and viewing the profile page of the target, the participants were thenasked to answer a series of 11 questions about their interest in the target. Four of these items

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
14served as dependent variables. Attractiveness was measured with the item, “how physicallyattractive is this individual?” To measure short-term mating, participants were asked “how likely
would you be to hook up with the individual?” To create the dependent variable of long-term
pursuit, I combined the questions of “how likely would you be to meet up for a date with thisindividual?” and “how likely would you be to pursue a relationship with this individual?”Participants answered these questions using 5-point scales (1= not at all likely, 5= very likely).
Prior to debriefing, participants were given a manipulation check that asked them toindicate the sex of the person with whom they were matched and the target’s relationship status.
Results
The manipulation check revealed that 82% of the participants correctly identified therelationship status of the target with whom they were matched, suggesting that not everyone paid
attention to this detail prior to making their judgments. All but one participant correctly
identified the sex of the target, which likely occurred in error. In the analyses below, all data
were included for analysis.
Means and standard deviations for both genders on all personality measures are presented
in Table 1. Briefly, men scored significantly higher than women on measures of primary
psychopathy. There was a marginally significant difference for Machiavellianism with men
scoring higher than women. No significant gender differences were detected for narcissism andsecondary psychopathy.
For the analyses, the single condition was coded as -.5 and the attached condition wascoded as .5. Participant relationship status was coded as -.5 for participants in a relationship and.5 for single participants. Gender was coded as -.5 for women and .5 for men. Narcissism,

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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Machiavellianism, and both primary psychopathy and secondary psychopathy were meancentered prior to computing the analyses. For each dependent variable, a series of stepwise
multiple regression analyses for each personality dimension were computed with gender,
condition, participants’ relationship status, and the personality dimension entered in Step 1, twoway interactions in Step 2, three-way interactions in Step 3, and four-way interactions in Step 4.
Tables 2-5 summarize Step 4 findings for primary psychopathy, secondary psychopathy,
Machiavellianism, and narcissism, respectively, for the dependent variables of finding the target
attractive, showing interest in pursuing a short-term relationship, and pursuing a long-term
relationship with target.
Some of the prior research on the Dark Triad has analyzed data by grouping all three ofthe related, yet unique, constructs of the Dark Triad into one personality dimension andgeneralizing based on this conglomeration. This approach to analysis undercuts the variance thateach component is contributing to the study. For example, Machiavellianism may play no role inmate poaching, but when researchers glob Machiavellianism, psychopathy, and narcissism into
one dimension and find a significant effect, then researchers can mistakenly conclude that
Machiavellianism is involved in mate poaching tendencies when psychopathy and narcissism
may be driving the effect. For my analyses, I analyzed each component separate from the othercomponents.
Primary Psychopathy
Analyses are summarized in Table 2. A main effect for primary psychopathy was not
significant for predicting attractiveness ratings, but it was trumped by a marginally significant
two-way (primary psychopathy X condition; p=0.07) and four-way (gender X participant
relationship status X condition X primary psychopathy; p=0.06) interaction. For single women

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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answering questions about a single male target, there was no relationship between primary
psychopathy and attractiveness ratings (r = -.01, p = .97, n = 25). For single men being asked
about a single target, the correlation between primary psychopathy and attractiveness ratings wasmoderate r = .48 (p = .11, n = 12). For single women rating a target in a relationship, there wasno significant association between primary psychopathy and finding the target attractive (r =.075, p = .73, n = 24). Single men viewing a target in a relationship revealed no significant
correlation between primary psychopathy and finding the target attractive (r = -.14, p = .74, n =8). For women in a relationship viewing a single target, there was a correlation of .37 (p = .17, n= 15). For men in a relationship rating a single target, the correlation was .22 (p = .38, n = 18).
For women in a relationship looking at a man in relationship, there was a correlation of -.34 (p =.18, n = 17). For men in a relationship looking at a woman in a relationship there was no
association (r = .06, p = .79, n = 22).
For pursuing a short-term relationship, a three-way interaction was found between
primary psychopathy, condition, and status. No significant association was found for participantsin a relationship matched with a single target (r = .16, p =.34, n = 37) or for single participants
paired with a target in a relationship (r = .003, p = .99, n = 39). However, a moderateassociation between primary psychopathy and pursuing a short-term relationship was detected
for single participants when matched with a single target (r = .56, p = .001, n = 33). The mostinteresting finding was revealed for participants in a relationship matched with a target who wasalso in a relationship; a marginally significant association between primary psychopathy andpursuing a short-term relationship was detected for these participants (r = .38, p = .06, n = 32).
Primary psychopathy did not serve as a significant predictor of mate poaching toestablish a new long-term relationship.

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
Secondary Psychopathy

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Secondary psychopathy played no significant role in predicting participants’
attractiveness ratings of the target, nor was it a predictor of how likely the participant would beto pursue a short or long term relationship with the target. (See Table 3).
Machiavellianism
Machiavellianism analyses are summarized in Table 4. Machiavellianism was not asignificant predictor for rating the target as physically attractive. For pursuing a short-term
relationship, three two-way interactions were found: one for Machiavellianism X gender, anotherfor Machiavellianism X relationship status, and one for Machiavellianism X condition. Teasing
apart these interactions with correlational analyses revealed that there were no significant
correlations for Machiavellianism X gender for both men (r = -.10, p = .45, n = 60) and women(r = .04, p = .70, n = 81). There were also no significant correlations for Machiavellianism andsingle participants (r = .16, p = .18, n = 72) and participants in a relationship (r = -.14, p = .27,
n = 69). For Machiavellianism X condition there was a marginally significant correlation for the
single condition (r = .23, p = .06, n = 70) and a non-significant finding for the attachedcondition (r = -.12, p = .32, n = 71).
For pursuing a long-term relationship, one significant two-way interaction was revealed
between Machiavellianism and gender. For this interaction, men scoring higher on measures of
Machiavellianism were less likely to pursue the target (r = -.28, p = .03, n = 60). There was no
significant finding for women (r = .07, p = .52, n = 81).
Narcissism
Narcissism analyses are summarized in Table 5. Narcissism failed to be a significant
predictor of participant attractiveness ratings; however, a significant main effect for narcissism

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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and pursuing a short-term relationship was detected. A three-way interaction between participant
relationship status, narcissism, and condition was also present for pursuing a short-term
relationship. Correlational analyses were used to break apart this three-way interaction. For
participants in a relationship matched with a single target, there was no significant association
between narcissism and pursuing a short-term relationship (r = .01, p = .96, n = 37). For single
participants matched with a single target, there was a moderate correlation between narcissism
and expressing interest in pursuing a short-term relationship with the target (r = .46, p = .01, n =33). However, there was no association between pursuing a short-term relationship andnarcissism if the participant was single and paired with a target that was in a relationship (r =.06, p = .73, n = 39). For participants in a relationship matched to targets in a relationship, there
was also no significant association for pursuing a short-term relationship and narcissism (r = .22,
p = .22, n = 32).
For pursuing a long-term relationship, another three-way interaction was revealed forgender, status, and narcissism. Teasing this interaction apart revealed a negative association
between narcissism and pursuing the target for female participants already in a relationship (r = .25, p = .09, n = 49). No significant associations were found between narcissism and pursuing
the target for single women (r = .28, p = .12, n = 32) and men in a relationship (r = .02, p = .92,
n = 20). For single men, a negative association was found for narcissism and pursuing a
relationship (r = -.30, p = .06, n = 40).
Discussion
Many of my results suggested that those who score higher on the constructs of the Dark
Triad do not prefer to pursue someone who is already in a relationship; however, one three-way
interaction between primary psychopathy, condition, and relationship status did predict

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
participant interest in pursuing a short-term relationship with the target who was in a19

relationship, but only if the participant was also in a relationship. I speculate this is due to theequal risk that is assumed by the poacher and the poached, both have current partners that they
could lose if the current partners were to find out about the infidelity.
Aside from the novel finding for primary psychopathy, some of my findings were counterto mate poaching. For instance, male participants already in a relationship were significantly
unlikely to indicate interest in a short-term relationship with the target, and Machiavellianism
was negatively associated with the pursuit of a short-term relationship for male participants
matched with a target who was in a relationship.
Although there was a small, yet significant, main effect for narcissism on pursuing ashort-term relationship, the findings were predicted by results of previous studies. For example, athree-way interaction between narcissism, condition, and relationship status revealed that single
participants paired with a single target were more likely to indicate pursuing a short-term
relationship with the target—highlighting the short-term sexual strategies of narcissists (Jonason& Buss, 2012). Another three-way interaction for narcissism with participant gender andparticipant relationship status showed that female participants already in a relationship were lesslikely to indicate pursuing a long-term relationship with the target, and that single men were also
unlikely to pursue a long-term relationship with the target.
I suspect that individuals high in the constructs of the Dark Triad have no specificpreference for targets already in a relationship but instead would pursue the path of least
resistance (i.e., pursuing a short-term relationship with the single target). However, thisspeculation only holds true for narcissism and Machiavellianism; as stated previously, primary
psychopathy was my only hint of mate poaching. Thus, although individuals who were higher on

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
20
the Dark Triad constructs reported experiences with mate poaching (Jonason, Li, & Buss, 2010),
it does not appear in this study that they prefer to mate poach.
As discussed earlier in this paper, a problem with self-report is that participants may
answer in ways the respondent believes is desirable, such as a narcissist exaggerating his/her
number of sexual partners. Participants may also be poor at introspection and monitoring theirown behaviors. These factors can all result in data that do not reflect a real-world scenario.
Strengths, Limitations, and Future Direction
One important consideration to note is that this study lacked statistical power due to asmaller sample size. Future data collection is needed to better analyze these tentative findings.
Although this study had an insufficient sample size, its methodology was a novel solution to thecurrent standard of correlating personality traits with self-reported acts of mate poaching. The
paradigm was borrowed from Parker and Burkley (2009) but used a more convincing format toassess mate poaching by leading participants to believe that they were truly on a college dating
website. This was also the first study to apply this paradigm to the Dark Triad. However, thisparadigm is not without limitations: the target’s profile had a lot of information on it and it ishard to say for certain whether the participants saw the relationship status of the target or simply
saw it and did not care.
For future directions, researchers should investigate other facets related to the Dark Triad,
such as the personality constructs of exploitation and entitlement. It may be that mate poaching is
a result of these specific traits rather than the collective traits of the Dark Triad. Although thecomponents of the Dark Triad are all characterized by a propensity for exploiting, thesecomponents predict an array of behaviors, such as impulsivity, aggression, and grandiosity, thatare seemingly unrelated to mate poaching and that could detract from uncovering the true

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
21
personality dimensions of the poacher. Not only should future researchers study these specificpersonality constructs, but they should also do so under a quasi-experimental design such as thisone.

Conclusion
This study demonstrated that past research investigating the Dark Triad in relation tomate poaching, may be constrained by its methodology and statistical limitations. Out of thethree constructs of the Dark Triad—narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism—only the
facet of primary psychopathy was linked to mate poaching, and this effect was only found if theparticipant was also in a relationship. It may be that most people, regardless of their own
relationship status, find other people attractive but would never actively pursue the individual orfind out if the individual was in a relationship. When mate poaching does occur, it may be due tothe poacher’s strong interest in the partner rather than to receive an ego boost or to intentionallyhurt the poachee.

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
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MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
Tables26

Table 1
Gender Differences
Categories

Male

Std. Dev. Female

Std. Dev.

t-testp-value

Machiavellianism

54.25

8.74

51.81

6.59

-1.81

.07

Primary Psychopathy

33.53

6.41

28.96

6.55

-4.13

.001***

Secondary Psychopathy

21.87

3.92

21.87

3.91

-1.26

.21

Narcissism

16.32

5.85

14.65

6.11

-1.63

.11

Note:
*

p < .05**

p < .01*** p < .001

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
Table 2

27

Primary Psychopathy Predicting the Outcome Variables
Variables

Attractiveness
β(t, p)

STM
β(t, p)β

Gender.66 (4.09,.001)***1.42 (7.16,.001)***.97(5.09, .001)***

Condition (Cond)-.09 (-.56, .57)-.08 (-.41, .68)

.06(.31, .76)

Relationship Status (RS).20

(1.24, .22)

.43 (2.16, .03)*.76(3.96, .001)***Primary Psychopathy (PP).01(.76, .45)

.02 (1.51, .13)-.01(-.53, .60)

Condition X Gender.28(.86, .39)

.08 (-.20, .84)-.37(-.96, .34)

Condition X RS

.11(.34, .74)-.21 (-.52, .60)-.13(-.35, .73)

Gender X RS-.22 (-.68, .50)-.01 (-.03, .98)-.16(-.42, .68)

PP X Condition-.04 (-1.8, .07)-.02 (-.71, .48)

.01(.29, .77)

PP X Gender.02(.76, .45)

.03 (.90, .37)

.02(.60, .55)

PP X RS-.01 (-.54, .59)-.01 (-.32, .75)-.03(-1.21, .23)

Condition X Gender X RS-.67 (-1.05, .30)-.51 (-.64, .52)

-1.43 (-1.88, .06)

Condition X Gender X PP

.003 (.07, .94)

.01 (.21, .84)

.04(.72, .47)

Condition X RS X PP-.03(-.58, .56)-.15(-2.52, .01)**-.08(-1.37, .17)

Gender X RS X PP-.003 (-.06, .96)

.01(.18, .86)-.07(-1.21, .23)

Gender X RS X Cond X PP

.18

-.10

(-.82, .42)

.08(.69, .49)

(1.89, .06)

Note: PP, primary psychopathy, RS, relationship status, Cond, condition*p < .05**

p < .01*** p < .001

LTP(t, p)

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
Table 3

28

Secondary Psychopathy Predicting the Outcome Variables
Variables

Attractiveness
β(t, p)

STM
β(t, p)β

Gender.80 (5.03, .001)***1.61 (7.95, .001)***.95(5.02, .001)***

Condition (Cond)-.06 (-.34, .73)-.08(-.38, .71)

.04(.19, .85)

Relationship Status (RS).14(.87, .39)

.40

(1.93, .06)

.67

(3.54, .001)***

Secondary Psychopathy (SP).03(-1.35, .18)

.02(-.64, .53)-.03(-1.10, .27)

Condition X Gender.29(.92, .36)

.01(-.02, .99)-.28(-.73, .34)

Condition X RS

.13(.42, .68)-.46(-1.14, .26)-.11(-.30, .78)

Gender X RS-.31(-.98, .33)-.05(-.12, .90)-.29(-.78, .44)

SP X Condition.01(.24, .81)-.02(-.32, .75)

.02(.46, .65)

SP X Gender-.03(-.75, .46)-.05(-.85, .40)

.04(.70, .49)

SP X RS.06(1.44, .15)-.01(-.09, .93)-.03(-.64, .53)

Condition X Gender X RS

-1.00 (-1.57, .12)

-1.33 (-1.65, .10)

-1.65 (-2.18, .03)*

Condition X Gender X SP-.06(.71, .48)-.07(-.66, .51)-.13(-1.20, .23)

Condition X RS X SP

.10

(1.14, .26)-.11(.98, .33)-. 11(-1.04, .30)

Gender X RS X SP

.01(.01, .99)-.07(-.64, .52)-.04(-.38, .70)

Gender X RS X Cond X SP-.14 (-.80, .43)

.157 (.70, .48)-.16(-.76, .45)

Note: SP, secondary psychopathy, RS, relationship status, Cond, condition*p < .05**

p < .01*** p < .001

LTP(t, p)

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
Table 429

Machiavellianism Predicting the Outcome Variables
Variables

Attractiveness
β(t, p)

STM
β(t, p)β

Gender.74 (4.77,.001)***1.51 (8.22, .001)***.96(5.32, .001)***

Condition (Cond)-.11 (-.70, .48)-.06(-.32, .75)

.04(.24, .81)

Relationship Status (RS)

.17 (1.09, .28)

.43

(2.37, .02)*.69(3.81, .001)***

Machiavellianism (M)-.01 (-.168, .87)-.02(-1.64, .11)-.02(-1.66, .10)

Condition X Gender.13 (.42, .68)

.10(.28, .78)-.25(-.70, .49)

Condition X RS

.20 (.65, .52)-.25(-.69, .49)-.09(-.24, .81)

Gender X RS-.22 (-.71, .48)

.01(.01, .99)-.15(-.41, .68)

M X Condition-.02 (-.90, .37)-.06(-2.28, .03)*-.04(-1.57, .12)

M X Gender-.01 (-08, .93)-.06(-2.15, .03)*-.06(-2.34, .02)*

M X RS.02 (1.01, .31)

.06

(2.32, .02)*.02(.68, .50)

Condition X Gender X RS-.70 (-1.13, .26)-.80(-1.01, .27)

-1.64 (-2.28, .02)*

Condition X Gender X M-.03 (-.73, .47)-.05(-1.00, .32)-.01(-.01, .99)

Condition X RS X M.04 (.86, .40)-.06(-1.02, .31)-.01(-.19, .85)

Gender X RS X M-.01 (-.21, .83)

.08

(1.5, .13)

.03(.61, .54)

Gender X RS X Cond X M-.14 (1.53, .13)

.02(.14, .89)

.09(.82, .42)

Note: M, Machiavellianism, RS, relationship status, Cond, condition*p < .05**

p < .01*** p < .001

LTP(t, p)

MATE POACHING AND THE DARK TRIAD
Table 530

Narcissism Predicting the Outcome Variables
Variables

Attractiveness
β(t, p)

STM
β(t, p)

Gender.74 (4.76, .001)***1.55 (8.27, .001)***1.02 (5.68, .001)***

Condition (Cond)-.06 (-.42, .68)-.04(-.22, .82)

.08(.46, .65)

Relationship Status (RS)

.16 (1.03, .30)

.39

(2.09, .04)*.68(3.79, .001)***

Narcissism (N).02 (1.69, .09)

.04

(2.54, .01)*-.01(-.30, .77)

Condition X Gender.18 (.57, .57)

.05(.13, .90)-.33(-.91, .37)

Condition X RS

.11 (.35, .73)-.43(-1.15, .25)-.18(-.50, .62)

Gender X RS-.19 (-.62, .54)-.10(-.27, .79)-.31(-.85, .40)

N X Condition.04 (1.31, .19)

.02(.65, .52)-.04(-1.57, .12)

N X Gender.02 (.73, .47)

.05

(1.42, .16)-.01(-.38, .70)*

N X RS-.02 (-.62, .54)

.01(.21, .84)-.01(-.02, .98)

Condition X Gender X RS-.80 (-1.30, .20)-.98(-1.30, .20)

-1.51 (-2.09, .04)*

Condition X Gender X N-.01 (-.10, .92)

.01(.07, .94)

.04(.59, .56)

Condition X RS X N-.03 (-.61, .54)-.17(-2.67, .01)**-.11(-1.75, .08)

Gender X RS X N-.05 (-.90, .37)-.09(-1.36, .18)-.16.

(-2.57, .01)**

Gender X RS X Cond X N.06 (.58, .56)-.17(-1.3, .20)-.01(-.06, .95)

Note: N, narcissism, RS, relationship status, Cond, condition*p < .05**

p < .01*** p < .001

LTP
β(t, p)