Unpacking “evil”: Claiming the core of the Dark Triad

• We claim that the core of the Dark Triad is equivalent to most conceptions of “evil”.
• We test 5 competing theories that claim to capture the core of the Dark Triad (i.e., the core of “evil”).
• We find that the HEXACO model of personality best accounts for the core of the Dark Triad.
• We position these results into the broader theoretical picture, including life history theory.

Understanding the nature of “evil” has been challenging for a number of reasons. A productive psychological approach to this problem has been to study antisocial traits associated with negative outcomes. One such approach has grouped together three antisocial personalities known as the “Dark Triad”: Machiavellianism, Narcissism, and Psychopathy. Researchers have proposed various models to account for the common core of these antisocial personalities – a core that might well be considered the psychological equivalent of the core of “evil” – and these models have not been directly compared, to date. We conducted two studies (total N > 700) to compare the utility of the various models using Canonical Correlation Analyses (CCAs). Results confirm that the HEXACO personality model (and, in particular, the Honesty–Humility factor) is not only the most theoretically parsimonious model, it also best accounts for the empirical overlap between these constructs that represents the core of the Dark Triad. Results also support the idea that the core of the Dark Triad represents an alternative life history strategy.