Expectancy biases underneath the Dark Triad traits: Associations with optimism, pessimism, and hopelessness

Personality traits play a key role in understanding optimism, but few studies have examined how “darker” aspects of personality relate to individual differences in trait-level optimism. We examined whether the Dark Triad traits (i.e., narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism) were associated with individual differences in optimism in three convenience samples from America, Brazil, and Hungary (N = 937) using three measures of individual differences optimism (i.e., Life Orientation Test; Lerner Optimism Scale; Beck Hopelessness Scale). Our results were rather compelling in that across measures and countries sampled, narcissism was associated with more optimism whereas psychopathy and Machiavellianism were associated with less. Results are discussed in terms of how such outlooks or expectancies are likely to color the social interactions that people characterized by the Dark Triad traits engage in and the social consequences they may experience.