The Dark Triad and Honesty-Humility: A Preliminary Study on the Relations to Pornography Use

Abstract

The present article reports on a preliminary study exploring the relationships between Dark Triad (narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy) and honesty-humility personality traits and pornography craving and deviant pornography use in a sample of 121 participants (46 men and 75 women) who completed an online survey. Narcissism and psychopathy were positively related to pornography craving and deviant pornography consumption, while honesty-humility appeared to be negatively associated with these pornography-related variables. Furthermore, the data suggested that these relationships were only present in men and not in women. While the current results should be interpreted with caution in the light of a number of limitations (i.e., small sample size, mainly well-educated participants), these results fit with the notion that men are more characterized by anti-social personality traits than women, and hence also have a greater inclination to engage in immoral and sexually deviating actions.