Psychopathy and associations with reward responsiveness and social networks in emerging adults

Abstract

Psychopathy is characterized by bold, callous, and disinhibited personality features. Research in psychopathy primarily focuses on associations with negatively-valenced social and affective constructs, but less work has investigated positively-valenced constructs. The present investigation examined self-reported psychopathy and associations with reward responsiveness and social networks among first-year university students (n = 245). Results indicated that the triarchic psychopathy facets uniquely mapped onto two different domains of reward; specifically, boldness predicted increased reward responsiveness whereas disinhibition predicted increased delay discounting. With respect to social networks, boldness predicted increased, and meanness predicted decreased, self-reported quantity and quality of peer relationships. These findings provide insight on reward-relevant models of psychopathy as well as the socially adaptive and maladaptive outcomes of psychopathy during emerging adulthood.