The association between psychopathic personality traits and health-related outcomes

• We examine the relationship between psychopathic personality traits and health burden in early adulthood
• We find that higher scores on psychopathic personality traits were associated with an increase in negative health outcomes
• We address the potential of these results to reduce health burden among psychopaths

PurposePsychopathy and psychopathic personality traits (PPT) have been linked to a long list of negative life outcomes. To date, however, few studies have provided a systematic analysis of whether psychopathic personality traits contribute to increased health burden. The current study was designed to address this gap in the literature.MethodThis study analyzed data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health and employed a measure of PPT derived from the five-factor model of personality. Analyses were conducted using OLS, logistic, and Poisson regression techniques.ResultsThe results revealed that relatively higher scores on psychopathic personality traits were associated with a slight increase in a wide range of negative health outcomes. These significant associations were detected for both males and females.ConclusionsWe speak to the importance of these findings for the potential to reduce health burden among psychopaths and those who score relatively high on measures of psychopathic personality traits.