The Dark Triad and intimate partner violence among pregnant women

Abstract

The current study examines verbal and physical intimate partner violence (IPV) as predicted by the Dark Triad traits (psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism) above and beyond associations with the Big Five personality variables, depression, and general hostility within a racially and socioeconomically diverse sample (n = 203) of pregnant women. Prior research indicates that psychopathy is a robust predictor of both IPV perpetration and victimization, but rarely do these analyses include other personality or psychosocial covariates. Key findings include direct effects of psychopathy as a positive predictor of verbal and physical IPV perpetration, as well as indirect effects of the above associations mediated by general hostility. In contrast, depression, but not psychopathy, was a unique predictor of verbal and physical IPV victimization. These findings expand the current literature by focusing on pregnant women as a uniquely vulnerable population and by examining unique direct and indirect effects of psychopathy in the presence of multiple psychosocial covariates.