Mimicking Desirable Intimate Partners: Adaptationism Applied to an Evolutionary Hypothesis of Psychopathy

Abstract

This thesis sought to examine the fundamental question asking whether psychopathy better represents an evolved personality disposition or is a result of disorder of the developing brain.The central concern for the hypothesis development and study design was to assess the potential function of psychopathy-whether the traits of psychopathy perform a specific function that was selected and shaped over time to have a specific effect on reproduction that explains its existence. From research of female mate preference, psychopathic deception and sexuality, and extreme phenotypic expression in males, a hypothesis is formalised and tested-the sexual exploitation hypothesis. Competing hypotheses-social exploitation and disorder hypothesesare also included to execute the method of multiple working hypotheses (Chamberlain, 1890(Chamberlain, /1965. The study used a two-part methodology. Study 1 included university males assessed on psychopathic traits being assessed on fluctuating asymmetry (FA) and video recorded telling feigned remorse stories and in dating scenarios. Study 2 included male and female participants who rated the remorse stories on genuineness, trustworthiness, and believability, and female participants rated the dating scenarios on desirability and left voicemail messages for the males.Results of Study 1 found that psychopathy was unrelated to FA, but inversely related to Factor 1.Results of Study 2 showed that female raters tended to give higher ratings of trustworthiness and believability to males higher in psychopathy compared to male raters. Additionally, single females and those high in Emotionality tended to consistently give preferentially higher ratings for high psychopathy males. Females tended to give higher dating scenario ratings for high psychopathy males (especially Lifestyle facet) and spoke in a higher voice pitch to males higher in Factor 1. Results support the sexual exploitation hypothesis over the competing hypotheses and implications of the hypothesis discussed. PSYCHOPATHY: MIMICKING DESIRABLE INTIMATE PARTNERSiii Acknowledgements I would first like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Adelle Forth, for taking me on as a graduate student to pursue ideas of evolutionary theory in psychopathy. She has provided me with amazing opportunities to build my skills as a researcher and scientist, and I am immensely grateful for her encouraging, curious, and optimistic attitude. This thesis project owes its structure and content to Dr. Forth's guidance and facilitation as a supervisor to promote the completion of the best project possible in such a short time. The pride and excitement I have in completing this work is deeply tied to the important role that she has played and I look forward to maintaining a rich and collaborative relationship in the future. I want to acknowledge the committee members for my thesis. First, Dr. Michael Seto, who provided recommendations during the thesis prospectus to include a task that can more directly assess the novel hypothesis. Because of Dr. Seto's recommendations...

Bashful Behaviours: The Association Between Perceived Vulnerability and the Dark Tetrad Personality Traits

“…Some evolutionary theories posit that psychopathic traits have been selected and adapted gradually to allow for the variability of trait expression within multiple environmental contexts (i.e., balancing selection theory), or to adaptively react to changing environmental circumstances (i.e., contingent shifts model) in order increase survival/mating strategies (reviewed in Buss, 2009;Glenn et al, 2011). Book and Quinsey (2004), for example, proposed that the psychopathic individual's propensity to engage in cheater (e.g., manipulation, deception) and warrior-hawk (e.g., impulsivity, aggression) behaviours have preserved over time, which would align best with the balancing selection theory (Brazil, 2017). Considering the psychopathic individuals' 'adaptive' tendencies, it is understandable why they have been coined "near-perfect invisible human predator[s]" (Babiak & Hare, 2006, p. 39).…”