Trump Supporters Report Having Higher Levels of Psychopathy, Manipulativeness, Callousness, and Narcissism

A study found that Trump supporters report enjoying the pain of others, lacking empathy and having higher levels of psychopathy, manipulativeness, callousness, and narcissism.

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Trump supporters report enjoying the pain of others, lacking empathy and having higher levels of psychopathy, manipulativeness, callousness, and narcissism, according to a new psychological study based on two large surveys of U.S. adults.

The Journal of Research in Personality reported that psychopathic traits and malevolent disposition predicted an increase in conservative political ideology, whereas a benevolent disposition predicted decreased conservative ideology, which is to sway more liberal ideology.

Conservative ideology was represented “by symbolic and operational ideology and positive view of Trump.”

The study found “psychopathic traits and malevolent disposition predicted increased conservative political ideology,” whereas “Benevolent disposition predicted decreased conservative ideology--i.e., more liberal ideology”.

It was really quite simple and rather discouraging: “Those viewing Trump favorably reported elevated malevolent and reduced benevolent dispositions, and less empathy.”

This study was specifically focused on support for Trump, as previous studies have already established an affinity between conservative ideology and authoritarianism. They note that not every conservative is an authoritarian, and I would add that anyone who is a principled, small government conservative rather than the predominance of today’s conservatives as reactionary, anti-rights for others conservatives who enjoy the pain of others would naturally not support executive power as displayed by an authoritarian. (Although history shows us that conservatives are drawn over and over again to strongmen populists types, but a similar argument could be made of extremists on the left.)

Conservatives have been shown to be drawn psychologically to social dominance orientation and right-wing authoritarianism in previous studies, but Trump has “radically reshaped” the U.S. conservatives to such an extent that he has moved the Republican Party toward authoritarianism.

This is to say, it’s not your imagination. Watching conservatives explain that they voted for Trump because he promised to inflict pain on a group of people the conservative dislikes has been exceptionally disconcerting for a reason: This is a sign that a large number of people are expressing malevolent traits as seen in psychopathy, and they’ve been doing it en masse for almost a decade now.

Below is a screen grab of a protester showing a photo of Donald Trump with Jeffrey Epstein during a 2018 Trump rally in Duluth, Minnesota, leading to Trump sneering at the protester, “Go home to your mom, darling” as he has security throw the man out. The crowd, that supposedly cares about the Epstein Files, boos the man who was trying to warn them.

And so the authors set about to examine “whether dispositions reflecting malevolent (aversive) features and the relative absence of benevolent (affiliative) features and empathy were associated with conservative ideology and views of Trump.”

They noted that like Trump (Hyatt et al., 2018, Nai et al., 2019), “autocrats manifest socially aversive personality, including malevolent traits in the Dark Triad: narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism (Nai & Toros, 2020).

This is to say: It’s not your imagination. Watching conservatives explain that they voted for Trump because he promised to inflict pain on a group of people the conservative dislikes has been exceptionally disconcerting for a reason: This is a sign that a large number of people are expressing malevolent traits as seen in psychopathy, and they’ve been doing it en masse for almost a decade now.

We live among these people and that is rightfully disturbing.

The violence Trump engenders against his perceived enemies is more proof of his dark influence on society and on his followers, and the authors note psychopathy has a significant link to violence and aggression.