Psychometrics properties of the Spanish version of two DarkTriadscales: The Dirty Dozen and the Short Dark Triad

Abstract

The Dark Triad refers to three malevolent personality traits, namely narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. The Dirty Dozen (DD) and Short Dark Triad (SD3) have been developed as concise scales for measuring these traits. This study examined the psychometrics properties of the Spanish version of the DD and SD3 in a non-clinical population recruited via the internet (N=454). For both scales, we found (1) an adequate fit for the hypothesized factor structure with three separate but correlated malevolent traits; (2) mostly moderate to goodreliability coefficients; (3) significant gender differences with males scoring higher on Dark Triad traits than females; (4) theoretically meaningful links with Eysenck’s personality supertraits; (5) positive correlations with externalizing and– albeit to a lesser extent–internalizing psychiatric symptoms; and (6) that most Dark Triad traits were positively associated with a socially desirable response tendency. It can be concluded that the Spanish DD and SD3 display highly similar psychometric qualities as the original scales and other translations of these measures.