Dark Triad Traits and Relationship Instability: The Mediating Role of Empathy Deficits

Abstract

The Dark Triad characteristics, including narcissism, Machiavellianism as well as psychopathy, are associated with manipulativeness, callousness, and self-promotion, which can potentially disrupt romantic functioning, but the processes by which these traits disrupt relationships have not yet been well studied in collectivistic cultures including Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) in Pakistan. It was a cross-sectional, correlational research design that sought to examine whether the mediating relationships between Dark Triad traits and the major relationship stability markers such as relationship satisfaction, emotional intimacy, commitment, conflict frequency, and attachment anxiety intervened through deficit in empathy (constructed by the Interpersonal Reactivity Index). In the study, 500 adults (51.4% women; 55.2% married; recruited in Peshawar, Mardan, Abbottabad, Swat, and Kohat) filled in standard measures in Urdu and English (SD 3, Inter-personal Reactivity Index (IRI),  RAS, PAIR emotional intimacy subscale, CTS2, ECR-R anxiety sub scale, and IMS commitment sub scale), via paper questionnaires and using the Google Forms and high confidence anonymity guarantees. In SPSS 27, Pearson correlations and the PROCESS (Model4; 5, 000 bootstrap; 95% bias-corrected CIs) were used to analyze the data. There was strong association between dark triangle traits and empathy deficits ( r =.62, p <.001 ) and moderate negative association with relationship satisfaction (r = -.48), emotional intimacy (r = -.44) and commitment (r = -.41), as well as positive association with conflict frequency (r = .46) and attachment anxiety (r =.39); all p<.001. The lack of empathy will be associated with the performance of all outcomes in the right directions (e.g., satisfaction r = -.55; conflict r=.52; p =.001). The results of mediation analyses showed that relationship satisfaction (indirect B = -.35, CI -.43 -.28, R2 =.42) and emotional intimacy (indirect B = -.31, CI -.38- -.25, R2 =.38) had strong partial mediation and conflict frequency (B =.34, CI.27.42) a significantly important indirect effect. Together, the findings indicate the role of impairment of empathy as a key mediator between Dark Triad pathology and relationship distress in KPK and thus, empathy as target of preventive and remedial intervention to achieve relationship stability.

Keywords: Dark Triad, narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, empathy deficits, cognitive empathy, affective empathy, relationship satisfaction, emotional intimacy, commitment, conflict frequency, attachment anxiety, romantic relationship instability, collectivistic culture, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK), Pakistan.