Lie to me, lie to yourself? The dark triad, dishonesty, and false memory

The Dark Triad Traits (DTT: consisting of Psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and Narcissism) are clearly linked to deceptive and manipulative behaviour, yet little is known about whether people with high levels of DTTs deceive themselves in order to convince others. This online study investigated whether the DTTs predicted false memory levels, assessed by the DRM paradigm (Deese, 1959: Deese & McDermott, 1995), which was modified to include three neutral word lists and three word lists constructed around DTT-related lures (Power, Control, and Status). The sample (n=161) consisted of 136 females and 25 males from the undergraduate research pool and through social networks. Among the three DTTs, psychopathy was most closely predictive of self-reported dishonesty. However, results showed that psychopathy and narcissism significantly predicted lower rates of adopting false memories for neutral lures, whereas Machiavellianism was somewhat predictive of adopting higher false memory levels, particularly for the DTT lure (control). These findings indicate that among the DTTs, psychopathy and narcissism are associated with a lower likelihood of self-deception, while Machiavellianism may increase the probability of self-deception.