When dark meets blue: The relations between dark triad personality and depression symptoms

Prior research on the effects of personality on depression has focused heavily on the Five Factor Model (FFM). However, the FFM has recently been criticized for that it does not capture the "dark side" of personality. To address this research gap, a field study consisting of two waves of survey was conducted to explore the relationships between the Dark Triad (DT) personality traits and depressive symptoms. Results of a path analysis on data collected from a sample of 228 full-time employees from diverse industries in Taiwan showed that Machiavellianism and psychopathy were positively associated with the interpersonal and cognitive dimensions of depressive symptoms, respectively. Narcissism was found to be the strongest predictor of depressive symptoms among the DT traits - It was found to be associated with all four dimensions of depressive symptoms and the relationships were all negative. Overall, these findings provide evidences for the effects of the dark side personality traits on depression, while the pattern of relationships between each DT trait and depressive symptoms were different.