Abstract
ABSTRACT This article analyzes the relationship between the maximization of personal and company gains and the moderate traits of the Dark Triad. The relevance of choosing this topic lies in investigating the attitude of executives who exhibit characteristics of a moderate intensity between the strong and weak traits. It is proven that the vision and charisma of narcissistic individuals, the strategy and tactics of Machiavellian individuals, and the creativity and good strategic thinking of psychopathic individuals are differentiating characteristics that enhance successful and integrative leadership and that are far from the more accentuated and opportunistic attitudes related to the strong traits, whose practices involve dishonest actions for personal gain. This evidence creates the possibility for strengthening the research in the accounting area, especially on the behavioral approach, in order to promote its interface with psychology and clarify how personality, values, and experiences influence managers’ choices when conducting business and how workers and companies are impacted by these decisions. The study is empirical-theoretical and involves 263 managers, adopting a survey as its data collection strategy and applying a self-reporting type questionnaire. The data analysis approaches included descriptive statistics, correlations, tests of means, and logistic regressions. In this study, managers with moderate psychopathic traits showed a lower tendency to maximize profit by manipulating results. An opposite tendency was revealed for those with moderate Machiavellian traits. The combined effect of the three Dark Triad traits was significant and positive, revealing opportunistic profit maximization. These findings contribute to future studies that aim to systematically analyze moderate levels of the triad and corroborate the findings that have revealed the common characteristics of manipulation, callousness, and dishonesty when investigating the interactive effect between the traits in question.
Highlights
Profit maximization is a standard act in the area of business, but at times it reveals the opportunistic character of executives in their greed and desire to serve their own interests (Koch, 2010), especially when they are in possession of privileged information about the economic and financial position of a company or have knowledge of the weak points in a corporate governance structure and internal controls (Troy, Smith, & Domino, 2011)
Regarding the frequency of the traits by level, revealed based on the tercile, Machiavellianism and psychopathy presented the highest proportions (38% and 41.1% in the low ranges, respectively) and narcissism presented the highest proportion in the moderate ranges (43%)
The results enable the inference that there is a significant relationship between the Dark Triad traits and profit maximization, corroborating with the previous studies that related traits of Machiavellianism (Austin et al, 2007; Hartman & Mass, 2010; Murphy, 2012; Shafer & Wang, 2011), narcissism (Frino et al, 2015; Ham et al, 2017; Johnson et al, 2013; Rijsenbilt & Commandeur, 2013), and psychopathy (Boddy, 2006; Clarke, 2005; Jones, 2014) with earnings management and corporate fraud
Summary
Profit maximization is a standard act in the area of business, but at times it reveals the opportunistic character of executives in their greed and desire to serve their own interests (Koch, 2010), especially when they are in possession of privileged information about the economic and financial position of a company or have knowledge of the weak points in a corporate governance structure and internal controls (Troy, Smith, & Domino, 2011). The psychological theory of personality supports the studies from Babiak, Neumann and Hare (2010), Chatterjee and Hambrick (2007), Jain and Bearden (2011), Maccoby (2004), and Rosenthal and Pittinsky (2006) in their analysis of the relationship between the personality traits of narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy and the behavior of executives in the corporate environment, in light of the importance of analyzing the impact of these traits on financial reports (Majors, 2015; Amernic & Craig, 2010; Johnson, Kuhn, Apostolou, & Hassell, 2013; Olsen, Young, & Dworkis, 2013), especially for detecting tendencies to commit fraud (Murphy, 2012; Cohen, Ding, Lesage, & Stolowy, 2010), white collar crimes (Collins & Schmidt, 1993; Blickle, Schlegel, Fassbender, & Klein, 2006), and to engage in earnings management (Olsen & Stekelberg, 2016; Ham, Lang, Seybert, & Wang, 2017; Brown, 2014; Frino, Lim, Mollica, & Palumbo, 2015; Buchholz, Lopatta, & Maas, 2014; Jones, 2014; Rijsenbilt & Commandeur, 2013; Shafer & Wang, 2011; Boddy, 2006; Deutschman, 2005; McCormick & Burch, 2005). Individuals who are rich in these attributes exhibit behavior with tendencies for self-promotion, emotional coldness, duplicity, and aggressiveness
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