Content uploaded by Laura Visu-Petra
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Laura Visu-Petra on Apr 08, 2023
Content may be subject to copyright.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
Available online 31 March 2022
0001-6918/© 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0/).
The tangled webs they weave: A scoping review of deception detection and
production in relation to Dark Triad traits
Andreea Turi
a
,
b
, M˘
ad˘
alina-Raluca Rebeleș
a
, Laura Visu-Petra
a
,
*
a
Research in Individual Differences and Legal Psychology (RIDDLE) Lab, Department of Psychology, Babeș-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania
b
Gherla Penitentiary, Andrei Mureșanu, 4, 405300, Gherla, Romania
ARTICLE INFO
Keywords:
Deception
Antisocial lie detection/production
Personality
Dark Triad
Narcissism
Machiavellianism
Psychopathy
ABSTRACT
People deceive for different reasons, from avoiding interpersonal conicts to preserving, protecting, and
nurturing interpersonal relationships, and to obtaining social status and power. A growing body of research
highlights the role of personality in both deception detection and production, with a particular focus on high
Dark Triad (DT) traits (Narcissism, Machiavellianism and Psychopathy), for their shared tendency to engage in
unethical self-benetting behaviors, despite negative consequences for others. The main goal of the current
scoping review was to bring together the studies investigating self-reported and performance-based deception
production and detection performances, as presented in individuals characterized by high DT traits and point out
the possible contribution of DT to deception research. To do so, we identied the relevant studies documenting
the similarities and discrepancies between the three personality traits and presented their results, based on the
procedure used for deception assessment: subjective or objective measurements for production / detection. Then,
we discussed possible explanatory mechanisms for inter-individual differences in lie detection / production and
argue for the contribution of DT to deception research beyond the typical personality models, particularly for the
antisocial character of deception.
0. Introduction
Deceptive behavior is a pervasive social strategy (Bryant, 2008) with
major costs for both interpersonal relationships and for society (Mar-
kowitz, 2021). Some people perceive themselves as better liars (Wissing
& Reinhard, 2019), and it has been suggested that some personality
traits might be benecial for lie production (Wright et al., 2015). To test
the assumption that personality can explain individual differences in
deceptive performance, several studies focused on the Dark Triad (DT)
traits; because of their shared tendency towards the manipulation and
exploitation of others for personal gain, including deploying a wide
variety of deceptive tactics (Paulhus & Williams, 2002). The current
study aims to clarify whether individuals scoring high on DT traits
(Narcissism, Machiavellianism, and Psychopathy) are indeed more
procient in lie production and detection, and to document potential
discrepancies between their self-perceived and actual deceptive
performance.
1. Deception: conceptual and methodological clarications
Deception is conceptualized as a complex social behavior that takes
many forms, occurs in many contexts, and arises for many reasons in
everyday human interactions (Gamer & Ambach, 2014). It can be un-
derstood as a deliberate attempt, whether successful or not, to conceal,
fabricate, and/or manipulate in any other way factual and/or emotional
information, by verbal and/or nonverbal means, in order to create or
maintain in another or in others a belief that the communicator himself or
herself considers false (Masip et al., 2004, p. 148).
Despite the interchangeable use of the terms “deception” and “lying”
(e.g. Vrij, 2000), some researchers propose a conceptual distinction
between the two constructs (Mahon, 2008). Compared to lying, decep-
tion production entails a broader range of deceptive strategies, such as
interpersonal manipulation (Paulhus & Williams, 2002), belief manip-
ulation (Ettinger & Jehiel, 2010), strategic negotiation (Gaspar &
Schweitzer, 2013), concealing, hiding, not revealing parts of the truth
(Vrij et al., 2001), cheating (Dye & Solomon, 2021) misrepresentations,
bluffs, falsications (Erat & Gneezy, 2012) and other behaviors which
* Corresponding author at: Research in Individual Differences and Legal Psychology Lab (RIDDLE), Babeș-Bolyai University, Republicii, 37, 400015 Cluj-Napoca,
Romania.
E-mail address: laurapetra@psychology.ro (L. Visu-Petra).
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Acta Psychologica
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/actpsy
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2022.103574
Received 3 August 2021; Received in revised form 18 March 2022; Accepted 21 March 2022
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
2
may increase the deceiver’s payoff at the expense of others. Some initial
conceptual clarications regarding deception-related concepts relevant
to our paper are presented in Table 1.
Deception measurement approaches divide into two broad cate-
gories: (1) subjective (self-reports); (2) objective (measuring deception
performance). Since complex laboratory procedures are required to
objectively measure participants’ deceptive performance, deception
research often preferentially relies on self-report to register participants’
perceptions of themselves or others when engaging in deception. Sub-
jective measures imply the use of self-report tools which require partici-
pants opinions on various aspects related to deception, (frequency,
motivation, intention, contexts, and types of preferred lies, stakes,
acceptability, lie detection verbal and non-verbal cues), as well as vi-
gnettes (Eckerd et al., 2021) and hypothetical scenarios (Azizli et al.,
2016), in which the participant is required to rate their willingness to
use deceptive behaviors as a strategy to achieve their goals.
Although self-report measures provide useful information about in-
ternal processes that would otherwise be inaccessible, several biases are
inherent to them. Firstly, recent evidence shows daily variation in the
number of lies reported by participants, generating what was described
as “good” or “bad” lie days (Serota et al., 2021)- therefore, catching just
a unique snapshot of their perception might not be revealing for their
general deceptive performance. Secondly, self-appraisals of objective
performance may be biased by the participant’s mood at that moment.
For instance, it has already been demonstrated that lying generates
emotions (Franck et al., 2008), such as anxiety (Visu-Petra et al., 2013).
Thirdly, the suggested correlations between social desirability (a
habitual tendency to present oneself favorably), lie telling frequency
(Kashy & De Paulo, 1996) and self-interested lies (Buta et al., 2020)
might additionally bias participants reports. In addition, there is always
the possibility that individuals may genuinely misestimate or misrep-
resent their performance to preserve a socially desirable image (DeAn-
drea et al., 2012).
Alternatively, objective measures mainly rely on behavioral and psy-
chophysiological indexes to detect deceptive behavior, including elec-
trodermal, cardiovascular, and respiratory responses, such as those
traditionally measured with the polygraph (Meijer & van Koppen,
2008). In addition to that, electroencephalographic, functional imaging
(Sip et al., 2008) and other innovative procedures were later added to
this arsenal (Gamer & Ambach, 2014). Participants in these studies are
requested to detect deceptive behavior after watching video recordings
with liars or truth tellers, online (Lyons et al., 2017; Wissing & Reinhard,
2017) or in the laboratory (Martin & Leach, 2013). Finally, the few
existing ecologically valid procedures require participants to produce
and/or detect deceptive behavior in direct social interaction contexts
(Lyons et al., 2017; Wissing & Reinhard, 2017; Wright et al., 2015; Geis
& Moon, 1981).
1.1. Deception motivations
People lie for different reasons, from avoiding interpersonal conicts
to preserving, protecting or nurturing interpersonal relationships, to
gaining social status and power. Evidence shows that the intention
behind the lie and the motivation for which the liar engages in deception
production determines the pro-social or anti-social nature of the lie
(Visu-Petra et al., 2022). This is because people usually judge the
character of a lie based on three aspects: a liar’s degree of awareness,
their motives and effects on the parties involved (Knapp & Comadena,
1979).
DePaulo et al., (1996) proposed that lies can be either (1) others-
oriented, told to protect or enhance someone else’s interests, usually
referred to as white lies and (2) self-oriented, told to protect the liar’s
interests. While the rst ones are seen as benign, harmless, and
acceptable, the latter are considered exploitative, harmful, and unac-
ceptable (Bryant, 2008). The perceived effects of the self-benet versus
other-benet situations seemed to moderate the willingness to use
different deceptive strategies (Kim et al., 2008). Because of the negative
implications for the parties involved and interrelations to many “dark”
interpersonal behaviors (such as betrayal, cheating, or manipulation), in
our scoping review we will focus mainly on the anti-social, self-inter-
ested type of deception.
1.2. Deception: production and detection
While most studies on lie detection and production were conducted
within the legal eld, where accurate judgments of veracity are para-
mount (Hartwig & Bond, 2014), deception was investigated in many
other contexts such as romantic (Cole, 2001), economical (Ettinger &
Jehiel, 2010), or organizational (Bachkirova, 2015). Most of them
focused on one of the two aspects of deception (production or detection)
and few addressed a potential general deceptive ability, which would
entail both production and detection of lies for the same individual (e.g.
Wright et al., 2012).
A seminal study documented the frequent use of lies in everyday life,
with a mean of one or two lies per day (DePaulo et al., 1997). Most of
these lies are told by prolic liars, who report telling ve or more lies per
every single white lie told by an average person (Serota & Levine, 2015).
They are more inclined to use deception for personal interest and
frequently characterized by aversive personality traits (Lyons, 2019). In
addition to this, recent ndings showed that individuals with this type of
personality were more inclined to lie in day-to-day interactions
compared to online settings, and they did it for selsh reasons (Mar-
kowitz, 2021), compared to most individuals from the general popula-
tion, who reported telling zero lies on a given day (Curtis et al., 2021).
Despite the frequent use of lies, people were notoriously poor at
Table 1
Lying and deception detection/production. Conceptual clarications.
Key term Conceptual clarications
Lying =making a verbal believed-false statement (to
another person) with the intention that that
statement be believed to be true (by the other
person) (Mahon, 2008)
Deception =deliberate act of conveying false information (
Nortje & Tredoux, 2019) and use of statements
and/or behaviors, including acts of omission,
that intentionally mislead a counterpart (Gaspar
& Schweitzer, 2013)
Lie production =making a believed-false statement (to another
person), either with the intention that that
statement be believed to be true (by the other
person), and/or with the intention that it be
believed (by the other person) that that
statement is believed to be true (by the person
making the statement) (Mahon, 2008)
Lying detection =the assessment of a statement with the goal to
reveal possible intentional deceit. Lie detection
may refer to a cognitive process of detecting
deception by evaluating message content, as
well as non-verbal cues (Granhag et al., 2015)
Successful detection =the correct discrimination between true and
false statements (Bond, 2008) - usually
quantied as a percent - the detection accuracy
rate
Successful deception =the successful deliberate attempt (without
forewarning), to create in another a belief that
the communicator considers to be untrue, in
order to increase the payoff of the
communicator at the expense of the other side (
Vrij, 2000)
Deception production/detection
Perception vs. Performance
Perception =participants’ self-reported
deception detection / deception production
ability (Wissing & Reinhard, 2019) /
Performance =participants’ deceptive behavior
assessed with objective measures (experimental
procedures and tasks, (Wissing & Reinhard,
2017)
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
3
detecting deception (Bond & DePaulo, 2008) with detection accuracy
rates close to 54% (Bond & DePaulo, 2006). Since deception is a
cognitively demanding task, cognitive capacities may inuence the
perceived cognitive load in deception production tasks (Van’t Veer
et al., 2014) and better intelligence may assist the liars in managing their
emotions during deception production, as well as increase the lie de-
tector’s focus on relevant cues when detecting deception in others. For
example, Drouvelis and Pearce (2021) documented a positive relation
between general intelligence and the use of white lies; Michels et al.
(2020) showed that general intelligence was signicantly related to
lying ability, and Gaspar et al. (2021) suggested that enhanced
emotional intelligence might benet people to use, detect and respond
to deception in organizational settings.
There was the assumption of so-called experts, or “lie detection wiz-
ards” (e.g. law enforcement), who claimed to have a 70–80% detection
accuracy rate (O’Sullivan & Ekman, 2004). However, this reported ac-
curacy was unsupported by Bond and DePaulo’s (2006) meta-analysis,
which showed no signicant correlation between gender, age, educa-
tion, experience, and condence in detection accuracy. Similarly,
Aamodt and Custer (2006) found that presumed experts (e.g. police
ofcers, detectives, judges, and psychologists) failed to outperform the
laypeople and suggested that experts might hold more stereotypical
beliefs about deception clues (e.g. gaze aversion for law enforcement
professionals). Furthermore, Reinhard et al. (2012) found that inducing
a subjective feeling of experience (e.g. with a specic type of crime such
as theft) in police ofcers increased their detection accuracy, even if
they were objectively inexperienced, and they were more accurate in
detecting true statements than deceptive ones. It was also suggested that
people might develop sensitivity to lies related to their professional
eld, as example, therapists may be better at detecting emotion related
lies, while police ofcers may be better at detecting crime related lies
(O’Sullivan et al., 2009), although this assumption has not yet been
empirically documented. In line with these ndings, a previous sys-
tematic review of personality traits associated with being a “good liar” in
policing contexts (Semrad et al., 2019) showed that certain traits, skills,
and abilities behind sender demeanour (for instance, believability and
honesty) might be essential to lie production and also suggested that the
motivation to lie can inuence deceiver’s performance (e.g. researcher’s
instruction to lie might reduce participant’s fear, guilt, and benet
successful deception).
Based on the assumption that deception production and detection
skills might be improved via feedback, some researchers compared ex-
perts and criminals, and found that offenders obtained an enhanced
accuracy rate in lie detection and held less stereotypical beliefs about the
relevant cues to deception detection (Hartwig et al., 2004). A possible
explanation might be that living in an unpredictable and harsh envi-
ronment, made them more sensitive to specic environmental cues and
affected their personality development, facilitating the acquisition of
certain malevolent traits, such as Machiavellianism, Narcissism and
Psychopathy (Birk´
as et al., 2020), which are known to have deception as
a central component of their structure (Wright et al., 2015). Not sur-
prisingly, these personality features are more prevalent in prison pop-
ulations (e.g. Psychopathy, Coid et al., 2009).
In what follows, we will briey outline the interrelations between
typical personality traits, aversive personality and deceptive behavior,
as a preamble to our scoping review on DT personality traits and
deception.
2. Personality and deception
The Five-Factor model (FFM, McCrae & Costa, 2008) is a reference
point in personality research, followed by the six-dimensional model of
personality characteristics known as the HEXACO model (Lee & Ashton,
2014). The rst documents the existence of ve main dimensions:
Neuroticism, Openness to Experience, Extraversion, Agreeableness and
Conscientiousness (Bara´
nczuk, 2021), while the second adds a new
dimension: Honesty-Humility, conceptualized as the willingness to
reduce one’s tness in favor of another persons’ (e.g. by sharing re-
sources, Zettler et al., 2021). Low levels of Agreeableness and low
Honesty-Humility HEXACO were related to immoral and socially ques-
tionable behaviors and many researchers suggested they describe the
core of dark personality (Dark Triad, Dini´
c & Jevremov, 2021; Dark
factor, Zettler et al., 2021). Most relevant for deception research is the
Agreeableness dimension, because of its correlation to deception
detection (Elaad & Reizer, 2015).
Within the last decade, the study of “dark” personality traits received
a lot of attention, starting from Paulhus and Williams (2002) who
introduced the concept of a “Dark Triad” (DT) unifying subclinical
Narcissism, Machiavellianism and Psychopathy. DT describes people
who are prone to a wide range of antisocial and unethical behaviors
(Kleinlogel et al., 2018) such as deception, greed, hypocrisy, and
cunningness (Ashton & Lee, 2007), have low levels of guilt, shame, and
fear (George et al., 2014) and are more willing to use deception and
interpersonal manipulation for personal goals (Hart et al., 2021). The DT
personality traits share a common “dark core” characterized by self-
centeredness, deceitfulness, manipulation, and callous unemotional
tendencies. Besides this common core, each dimension entails specic
behavioral, attitudinal, and moral components, which determine their
uniqueness (Jones & Figueredo, 2013), and all share a predisposition
towards deceptive, unethical and antisocial behaviors, that may benet
oneself, despite negative consequences for others (Moshagen et al.,
2018).
In comparison to the other members of the Triad (Machiavellianism
and Psychopathy), individuals scoring high on sub-clinical Narcissism
are characterized by egocentricity (Morf & Rhodewalt, 2001), grandi-
osity, excessive self-love, entitlement, dominance, superiority (Raskin &
Hall, 1981), high levels of alertness and sensitivity to possible social
status threats (Pfattheicher, 2016). They also endorse positive attitudes
towards deceptive communication and consider deceptive skills as at-
tributes that may serve well in social contexts (Kashy & De Paulo, 1996).
Individuals scoring high on Machiavellianism are described as cold,
strategic, calculated, manipulative, and deceitful, with a cynical view of
the world and a willingness to engage in manipulative and scheming
strategies towards personal goal achievement (Jones & Paulhus, 2009).
They are characterized by a duplicitous interpersonal style, cynicism,
strong condence in interpersonal manipulation, exclusive self-interest
(Jones & Paulhus, 2009), social maneuvering (Baughman et al.,
2014), a tendency towards the use of unethical behaviors, manipulation
of others for personal goals (Set, 2020), attainment of money, power
(Stewart & Stewart, 2006), and a preference for deceitful and duplici-
tous behavior to gain dominance (Fehr & Fischbacher, 2006). They
describe themselves as impulsive, undisciplined, impatient, unambitious
sensation-seekers, in addition to being suspicious, cynical and manipu-
lative (Miller et al., 2019).
Individuals scoring high on Psychopathy are described as cold,
callous, unemotional, non-empathetic (Hare, 1985), impulsive and
antisocial (Williams et al., 2007) and are similar to individuals scoring
high on Machiavellianism in the deceptive strategies they use (Muris
et al., 2017). Compared to them, individuals scoring high on sub-clinical
Psychopathy, are more aggressive, exploitative (Jonason & Webster,
2012) and antisocial (Williams et al., 2007). From all three members of
DT traits, sub-clinical Psychopathy is the prototypical example for lying,
deception, and manipulation (Cleckley, 1976; Cooper & Yuille, 2007) as
a dening trait.
However, there is insufcient evidence to show whether individuals
scoring high on DT traits are good liars or lie detectors (e.g. Wright et al.,
2014). On the one hand, it is plausible that their frequent engagement in
unethical behaviors purposes (the hallmark of all DT personality fea-
tures) generates a better ability to produce and detect similar attempts in
social interactions (Gino, 2015). From a phylogenetic point of view, the
literature refers to them as socially adaptive, characterized by “fast life”
strategies (Jonason & Webster, 2012) and more oriented towards self-
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
4
utility maximization (Moshagen et al., 2018), regardless of the costs of
their behaviors for others. This pattern of egoistic behavior indicates
their tendency towards using a “cheater strategy”, characterized by
acting selshly and employing of a wide variety of unethical strategies,
for instrumental purposes. On the other hand, excessive focus on per-
sonal interest, egocentricity, and inability to read others’ intentions (e.g.
poor Theory of Mind, Oey et al., 2019), might decrease their lie pro-
duction and detection abilities. Furthermore, if dark individuals,
particularly individuals scoring high on Machiavellianism, assess that
there are no benets from using deceptive behaviors, executing them is
too difcult or there is a big chance of getting caught, they prefer to
refrain from using them to prevent negative consequences for them-
selves (Rauthmann & Kolar, 2012). Special populations such as of-
fenders who reported considerably higher levels of Psychopathy,
Narcissism, and Machiavellianism than non-offenders (Navas et al.,
2021) were shown to perform signicantly worse than non-offenders in
accurately classifying true and deceptive messages (Schindler et al.,
2019). Differences between results of the studies investigating DT in
typical and special populations might be confounded by involving
different DT measures, such as the composite score from the Short Dark
Triad (SD3, Jones & Paulhus, 2014), or the Dirty Dozen (DD, Jonason &
Webster, 2010).
Also, noted in their review that much of the DT research is incon-
clusive, since many studies were conducted on student groups (who
received something in return for their participation) and draws our
attention to the specicity of the measures used for DT constructs, both
as total and as separate scores. They suggested that the existing mea-
sures for Machiavellianism do not measure Machiavellianism, per se, but
another version of Psychopathy and studying the DT as a constellation
fails to provide signicant additional information (see also Glenn &
Sellbom, 2015). Moreover, DT constructs might depend on the measure
and the specic sub-dimension examined. Specically, core elements of
each sub dimension showed very different and sometimes even opposite
relationships with other personality domains, observable only when the
constructs were measured separately (Watts et al., 2017).
3. Methodology
A scoping review of the available evidence regarding deception
detection and production in individuals scoring high on DT is warranted
to examine, summarize, disseminate the existing ndings, and identify
research gaps in the literature (Daudt et al., 2013).
Towards its completion, we used Arksey and O’Malley’s (2005)
methodological framework for scoping reviews and followed ve stages.
First, we formulated the research questions, and then we searched,
identied, selected the relevant publications, charted the data, sum-
marized, and reported the results. In the end, we discussed each result,
suggesting possible explanations.
The current study aims: (1) To bring together the studies investi-
gating self-reported and performance-based deception production and
detection in the DT personality traits, and (2) To document the contri-
bution of DT features in explaining individual differences in deception
production and detection, beyond the Five-Factor model of personality.
We expand on the only existing previous attempt to review the existing
literature on personality correlates of “good liars”, Semrad et al. (2019),
which was yet circumscribed to policing contexts (law enforcement,
police). This previous review was also limited to empirical studies
published between 1978 and 2018, and did not explicitly distinguish
between self-report and objective measures of deception, mainly
focusing on lie production.
To identify relevant studies, we conducted multiple computer-based
searches on several electronic databases, including, but not limited to,
ERIH PLUS, Psych Info, Web of Science and Science Direct and Google
Scholar, using the keywords: deception, deception detection, deception
production, lie production, lie detection, Dark traits, Dark Triad,
deception production and deception detection. We excluded studies in
which deceptive performances were measured only by psychophysio-
logical/imaging methods (such as fMRI, polygraph, and other brain
scans) and those using indirect measures for deception production
/detection (Klaver et al., 2009), youth population (Peace & Sinclair,
2012), or written in a different language than English. After identifying
and screening the publications according to our inclusion-exclusion
criteria and removing the duplicates, 19 publications remained
eligible for the current scoping review, from which 7 used self-reports to
assess perceived deceptive skills and 12 using experimental tasks to
measure deceptive performances, with 1 using both assessment tools
(see Table 2 and Table 3 for a visual summary of the signicant ndings
reported by all studies included).
4. Results
The tables below present the studies we identied as addressing the
relation between DT traits and self-reported (Table 2) or performance-
based (Table 3) measures of deception detection or production.
5. Discussion
We have so far summarized emerging ndings on the interrelations
between DT personality traits and deceptive behavior, based on the
subjective or objective measurement of deceptive skills. As it can be
observed, most studies with subjective measurement of deceit used SDT-
3 and treated DT’s dimensions as a unitary construct, compared to those
which investigated the deceptive performance in an objective manner
and mostly used separate measures for DT’s dimensions. The results
obtained from such traditional instruments, namely MACH-IV for
Machiavellianism, NPI for Narcissism and SRP-III for Psychopathy,
might be more reliable than those reported by the assessment of DT as a
unitary construct (Furnham et al., 2013). One argument in this direction
is that each DT trait maintains slightly different intrapersonal factors
(Koehn et al., 2018). As previously noted, there might not even be three
traits, but merely a combined Machiavellianism-Psychopathy dimension
and Narcissism, in the case of both the SD3 and the DD measures
(Persson et al., 2017). Hence, the recommendation of using separate
long instruments for each Dark Trait (Kajonius et al., 2016).
5.1. Deception production
The majority of self-report studies investigated DT dimensions as a
composite and showed that Machiavellianism and Psychopathy were
frequently associated with different aspects of deception and are more
similar in the “cheat strategy” they use, as suggested by the numerous
correlations with intra/intersexual deceptive tactics (such as domi-
nance, sincerity, superiority, indifference). In contrast, Narcissism was
associated only with intersexual deception for dominance and appear-
ance (Jonason et al., 2014). Specically, they both reported increased lie
frequency and propensity to lie across contexts in all studies (e.g.
Baughman et al., 2014; Daiku et al., 2021), compared to Narcissism, in
case of which results are mixed. Baughman et al. (2014) also found that
all individuals scoring high on all three DT dimensions reported positive
emotions when lying and those scoring high on Narcissism and Machi-
avellianism shared the belief that others will believe their lies.
In two studies, Narcissism was unrelated to the general propensity to
lie (Azizli et al., 2016) and lie frequency (Daiku et al., 2021) while in
another, it was associated with a willingness to lie in professional and
academic contexts (Forsyth et al., 2021). One explanation in this regard
may lie in their self-deceptive tendencies (Wright et al., 2015). When
Narcissism was investigated as a separate dimension (Zvi & Elaad,
2018), differences were observed for the three subscales, meaning that
different aspects of Narcissism related differently with aspects of
deception, reinforcing the previous recommendation for using separate
measurement tools for each construct, rather than assessing DT traits as
a composite.
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
5
Table 2
The Dark Triad and self-reported deception.
Authors (year) Dark traits
(measures)
Deception (measures & indexes) Participants,
gender, mean age
Main ndings
Deception production
Baughman et al.
(2014)
Dark Triad
(SDT-3)
- Probability of lying in mating and academic contexts
- Emotional state when lying (positive-negative)
- Cognitive effort to lie successfully
- Others’ reactions (the degree to which they believed that the
person being lied to: partner or lecturer, would believe their
lie)
N =462
130 men
(19.4 years)
Mating context:
- N was unrelated to probability of lying (r =0.07, n. s.) and correlated with positive emotions when lying (r
=0.25**), increased cognitive effort (r =0.18**) and belief that the partner will believe their lie (r =0.11*)
- M correlated with probability of lying (r =0.10*), positive emotions when lying (r =0.34**), increased
cognitive effort (r =0.15**) and belief that the partner will believe their lie (r =0.13**)
- P correlated to probability of lying (r =0.13**), positive emotions when lying (r =0.46**), increased
cognitive effort (r =0.14**) and unrelated to the belief that the partner will believe their lie (r =0.06, n. s.)
Academic context:
- N correlated with probability of lying (r =0.14**), positive emotions when lying (r =0.28**), belief that
the lecturer will believe their lie (r =0.19**) and unrelated with increased cognitive effort (r =0.08, n. s.)
- M correlated to probability of lying (r =0.25**), positive emotions when lying (r =0.33**), increased
cognitive effort (r =0.28**) and belief that the lecturer will believe their lie (r =0.16**)
- P correlated to probability of lying (r =0.19**), positive emotions when lying (r =0.42**), increased
cognitive effort (r =0.10*) and the belief that the lecturer will believe their lie (r =0.17**)
Jonason et al.
(2014)
Dark Triad
(SRP-III)
(MACH-IV)
(NPI-40)
Total number of lies in the last 7 days, number of people and
number of
- self-gain lies
- white lies
- no reason for lies
(Self-rated lying ability)
(DMTS) for intersexual and intrasexual deception
N =447
from which 161
men
(23.4 years)
- N correlated with total number of lies (r =0.10*), self-gain lies (r =0.20**), no reason for lies (r =0.18*),
and self-rated ability (r =0.29**) and unrelated with the use of white lies (r =0.06, n. s.) or the number of
people lied to (r =0.07, n. s.)
- M correlated with total number of lies (r =0.21**), the number of people lied to (r =0.20**), self-gain lies
(r =0.12*), white lies (r =0.13*), no reason for lies (r =0.16*), and self-rated ability (r =0.27**)
- P correlated with total number of lies (r =0.21**), number of people lied to (r =0.25**), self-gain lies (r =
0.14*), no reason for lies (r =0.26**), self-rated ability (r =0.40**), unrelated with use of white lies (r =
0.07, n. s.)
- Individuals scoring high on P and M were more similar in the “cheat strategy” (numerous correlations with
intra/intersexual deceptive tactics, such as dominance, sincerity, superiority, indifference). In contrast, N
was associated only with intersexual deception for dominance and appearance.
Azizli et al. (2016) Dark Triad
(SDT-3)
(PTLQ):
Lying behaviors and propensity to lie in 2 scenarios:
(1) mating
(2) academic
(CMI)
N =464,
131 males
333 females
(19.5 years)
- N unrelated to general propensity to lie (r =0.03, n. s.) but correlated with lying in both mating (r =
0.15**) and academic (r =0.17**) contexts.
- M correlated with general propensity to lie (r =0.12**) and lying in both mating (r =0.21**) and academic
(r =0.30**) contexts.
- P correlated with general propensity to lie (r =0.15**) and lying in both mating (r =0.19**) and academic
(r =0.21**) contexts.
- All three DT traits correlated with total score for misconduct, as following: N (r =0.16**), M (r =0.22**)
and P (r =0.45**), and associated differently with CMI subscales, such as bullying, drug abuse, delinquency,
and criminality.
Daiku et al. (2021) Dark Triad
(DTDD)
(Total number of lies in the last 24 h) N =340
(19.6 years)
The mean for lie telling in the last 24 h was 2.14 lies (SD =4.64)
Distribution of results:
- 45.4% of participants reported no lies
- 47.4% reported one to ve lies
- 7.2% reported six or more lies, which accounted for 47.2% of the total reported lies (154 out of 326 lies) =
the “a few prolic liars”
Lying frequency was correlated with P (r =0.14**), M (r =0.10*) and unrelated to N (r = − 0.08, n. s.)
Forsyth et al.,
2021)
Dark Triad
(SDT-3)
(SSIS)
Vignettes assessing the propensity to lie in three separate
contexts:
- professional
- academic
- relationship
For each context:
- Lying efcacy,
- Cognitive load
- Emotional response to lying (positive and negative)
N =615
(26.8 years)
Professional context:
- N correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.18***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.28***), cognitive load (r = − 0.24*),
positive affect (r =0.33***) and negative affect (r = − 0.09*)
- M correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.38***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.36***), cognitive load (r = −
0.17***), positive affect (r =0.37***) and negative affect (r = − 0.14***)
- P correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.23***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.24***), cognitive load (r = −
0.25***), positive affect (r =0.29***) and negative affect (r = − 0.14***)
Academic context:
- N correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.19***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.31***), cognitive load (r = − 0.18*),
positive affect (r =0.34***) and negative affect (r = − 0.09***)
- M correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.39***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.25***), cognitive load (r =
(continued on next page)
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
6
Table 2 (continued )
Authors (year) Dark traits
(measures)
Deception (measures & indexes) Participants,
gender, mean age
Main ndings
−0.19***), positive affect (r =0.39***) and negative affect (r = − 0.20***)
- P correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.23***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.24***), cognitive load (r =
−0.27***), positive affect (r =0.29***) and negative affect (r = − 0.17***)
Relationship context:
- N correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.21***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.18***), cognitive load (r = − 0.08*),
positive affect (r =0.29***) and unrelated to negative affect (r = − 0.03, n. s.)
- M correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.24***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.24***), cognitive load (r =
−0.11***), positive affect (r =0.24***) and negative affect (r = − 0.06***)
- P correlated with propensity to lie (r =0.15***), Lying Efcacy (r =0.12***), cognitive load (r =
−0.19***), positive affect (r =0.19***) and negative affect (r = − 0.11***)
Deception production and detection
Zvi and Elaad
(2018)
Narcissism
NPI
with 3
subscales:
- LA
- GE
- EE
(LTAAS)
Successfully lie-telling
Convincingly truth-telling
Successfully lie-detecting
Believing other people
Total number of lies in the last 7 days, number of people and
number of
- self-gain,
- altruistic,
- no reason lies
N =125
(25.7 years)
Total N correlated with successfully lie-telling (r =0.57**), convincingly truth-telling (r =0.52**),
successfully lie-detecting (r =0.52**) and believing other people (r =0.38**).
Total N correlated with tendency to lie (r =0.29*) the number of people lied to (r =0.24**), and differences
were observed for N’s subscales, as following:
- LA correlated with tendency to lie (r =0.20*) and telling lies for no reason (r =0.18*)
- GE correlated with tendency to lie (r =0.31*) and the number of people lied to (r =0.31*)
- EE correlated with tendency to lie (r =0.29*), the number of people lied to (r =0.21*) and self-gain lies (r
=0.19*)
N dimensions were unrelated to telling altruistic lies.
Wissing and
Reinhard (2019)
Dark Triad
(SDT-3)
Three 7-point Likert-type scales:
- Perceived deception detection ability
- Perceived deception production ability
- Behavioral cues of deception (22 statements based on the
beliefs about cues of deception documented by Hartwig and
Bond (2011)
N =205
58.5% male
41.4% female
(22–70 years)
- N correlated with perceived deception detection ability (r =0.16*) and deception production ability (r =
0.33***)
- M was unrelated to perceived deception detection ability (r =0.12, n. s.) and correlated with perceived
deception production ability (r =0.45***)
- P correlated with perceived deception detection ability (r =0.14*) and deception production ability (r =
0.44***)
No sig correlations between any of DT and cue-based detectability.
Note: * p <.05. ** p <.01, *** p <.001, n. s. =not signicant, n.m. =not mentioned.
Personality: N =Narcissism, M =Machiavellianism, P =Psychopathy, S =Sadism, SDT-3 =Short Dark Triad (Jones & Paulhus, 2014), NPI =Narcissistic Personality Inventory, with three subscales: LA – Leadership/
Authority, GE - Grandiose Exhibitionism, EE – Entitlement/Explosiveness (Raskin & Terry, 1988), MACH-IV =Machiavellianism Scale Version IV (Christie & Geis, 1970), DTDD =Dark Triad Dirty Dozen (Jonason &
Webster, 2010), SSIS =Short Sadistic Impulse Scale (O’Meara et al. 2011), Deception: DMTS =Deceptive Mating Tactics Scale (Tooke & Camire, 1991), PTLQ =Propensity to Lie Questionnaire (Azizli et al., 2016), CMI =
Comprehensive Misconduct Inventory (Paulhus & Williams, 2002), LTAAS =Lie-truth Ability Assessment Scale (Elaad, 2009, 2015).
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
7
Table 3
The Dark Triad and performance-based deception.
Authors (year) Dark trait(s)
(measures)
Deception tasks Participants (mean
age)
Findings (correlation coefcients, and statistical
signicance)
Deception production
Geis and Moon
(1981)
Machiavellianism
(MACH-IV)
Lie production (Group 1)
One half denied the knowledge of a theft, in which they
had just been directly implicated; the other half made
the same denial truthfully
Lie detection (Group 2)
Watched the 1.25 min videotape clips in random
sequence and judged the veracity of denials
N =360
64 Group 1 (G1)
64 Group 2 (G2)
(n.m.)
Comparisons between individuals scoring high and
low on M, revealed:
- In the Lie condition, judges believed more the lies
told by individuals scoring high on M, than they
believed the lies told by those scoring low on M (F =
7.19, p <.01). No signicant difference was observed
in the truth condition considered alone (F =0.15, n.
s.)
- Judges discriminated less accurately between
individuals scoring high on M lies and truths, than in
the case of those scoring low on M (F =19.89, p <
.001)
Martin and
Leach (2013)
Psychopathy (PPI-R) Selected videos of 15 lie-tellers and 30 truth-tellers.
Lie- tellers had been prompted to cheat by the
confederate, cheated on the test and denied cheating
during the interrogation. Truth-tellers had not been
induced to cheat, did not cheat, and denied cheating
during the interrogation.
N =117
from which
53 males,
64 females
(19.8 years)
No correlations between global P factor, individual
content scale scores and deception detection (all p >
.05)
Note: The sample included many individuals scoring
high on P even when compared with criminal
populations.
O’Reilly and
Doerr (2020)
Narcissism
(Resick)
(NPI-16)
(SINS)
(1) Lying =either failing to tell a car-buyer about a
faulty water pump (scenario S1) or telling a co-worker
that a recommendation option 2 gives the co-worker
more credit (scenario S2)
(2) Cheating in an online game of rolling the dice
(3) Self-reported willingness to steal a charger
N =401
(34 years)
- The three N measures were inter-correlated:
- SINS correlated with Lying in S1(r =0.26**), but not
in S2, also with Cheating (r =0.15*) and Willingness
to steal (r =0.19**)
- NPI-16 correlated with Lying in S1 (r =0.23**) and
S2 (r =0.24**), but unrelated to Cheating and
Willingness to steal.
- Resick was unrelated to Lying in both scenarios, but
correlated with Cheating (r =0.19*) and Willingness
to steal (r =0.27**)
Michels et al.
(2020)
Dark Triad
N (NARQ)
M (MACH-VI)
P (SRP-4)
Intelligence
(WAIS-IV)
Lying ability (LA) =indirectly measured by G2 (no of
raters successfully misled / no of raters that judged the
subjects’ stories)
Lie production: 50 students narrated three short stories
that took place in the last 24 h, 2 true and 1 ctional,
while videotaped in laboratory settings
Lie detection: 13 raters were informed that one of the
three stories was fabricated and requested to watch and
judge which story was deceptive
N =50 students
(Group 1)
N =13 academic
assistants/interns
(Group 2)
(22.6 years)
- P (Antisocial Behavior Subscale) correlated with LA
(r =0.30*), whereas other subscales did not.
- M was unrelated to LA (r = − 0.02, n. s.)
- N was unrelated to LA (r = − 0.09, n. s.)
- Intelligence was unrelated to LA (r =0.15, n. s.)
Deception detection
DePaulo and
Rosenthal
(1979)
Machiavellianism
(MACH)
Deception production: Participants were videotaped
while describing someone they liked, disliked, felt
ambivalent and indifferent about.
Deception detection: Participants returned to judge one
of these videotapes. They always judged a videotape on
which they did not appear
N =40
Students
(n.m.)
- The ability to recognize deception when the speaker
is hiding positive affect is not signicantly related to
the ability to recognize deception when the speaker is
hiding negative affect (r = − 0.18, n. s.)
- Speakers who get caught lying by women also tend
to get caught lying by men (r =0.62** for positive
affect and r-0.54** for negative affect)
- High M were more successful at getting away with
their lies than low M (F =3.04, p =.09; d =0.58)
High M were especially successful at deceiving when
pretending to dislike someone they genuinely liked,
(F =5.96, p <.05; d =0.79)
Lyons et al.
(2013)
Psychopathy
(SRP-III)
Primary P
Secondary P
Deception detection
On-line experiment presenting 26 clips (real-life high
stakes appeals, 13 truthful and 13 lies, from
international missing person websites
Truth/False judgments required
N =150
(21.1 years)
Sex moderated the relationship between P and lie
detection:
- In men, primary P was positively correlated with lie
detection (r =0.26**)
- In women, primary P was negatively correlated with
lie detection (r = − 0.24*)
- Secondary P was unrelated to lie detection in both
men (r = − 0.22, n. s.) and women (r =0.18, n. s.)
Lyons et al.
(2017)
Dark Triad
(SDT-3)
Deception detection
On-line experiment presenting 20 clips with real-life
high stakes appeals, 10 truthful and 10 lies, from
international missing persons websites
Truth/False judgments were required
N =347,
from which 98 men
(25.7 years)
In high stakes deception, results revealed sex
differences when judging the veracity of emotional
lies:
- In men, only N correlated negatively with deception
detection accuracy (β = − 0.24, t = − 2.30, p <.02).
- In women, only M correlated positively with
deception detection accuracy (β =0.28, t =3.46, p <
.001)
Wissing and
Reinhard
(2017)
Dark Triad
(DD)
Deception detection
In an online experiment, the participants were
instructed to watch 14 videos and decide, whether the
candidate was telling the truth or lying
N =207
59.9% female
(29.0 years)
- No association between DT traits and deception
detection.
- P and the DT composite were associated with
overcondence in lie detection accuracy.
(continued on next page)
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
8
As noted, Machiavellianism and Psychopathy were associated with
frequent lie telling and compared to Narcissism and Psychopathy, which
characterized individuals who did not prefer using white lies (Jonason
et al., 2014). Individual high on Machiavellian traits reported the use of
all types of lies, such as self-gain, white and no reason for lies. One
possible explanation might be their strategic nature and perceived self-
efcacy in producing convincing lies (Forsyth et al., 2021). Interest-
ingly, individuals scoring high on Machiavellianism and Psychopathy
reported increased levels of cognitive effort while lying in both contexts
(mating and academic), while individuals scoring high on Narcissism
didn’t consider lying cognitively demanding in mating contexts. Later
on, when asked about the perceived cognitive load associated with lying
in relational, professional, and academic situations, individuals scoring
high on all DT reported decreased cognitive load (Forsyth et al., 2021),
increased propensity to lie, more positive emotions, increased self-
perceived efcacy and low negative affect when lying, suggesting that
DT members share a preference for self-utility maximization in many
contexts. Not surprisingly, DT personality traits correlated with a wide
range of unethical behaviors such as bullying, drug abuse, delinquency,
and criminality (Azizli et al., 2016).
In terms of objective measurements, there were mixed results. As
already presented in Table 3, DT traits were unrelated to deception
Table 3 (continued )
Authors (year) Dark trait(s)
(measures)
Deception tasks Participants (mean
age)
Findings (correlation coefcients, and statistical
signicance)
Self-reported global condence in detection accuracy (1
item: “How many of the 14 videos do you think you
judged correctly?” rated on a Likert scale from 0 to 14)
Schindler et al.
(2019)
Dark Triad
(NARQ)
(MACH-IV)
(SRP-III)
Lie production: (prior to the study)
Truth condition: 10 participants witnessed a
confederate stealing 10 euros.
Lie condition: other 10 participants were asked to steal.
Next, liars and truth-tellers were asked about the
missing money,
Lie detection:
Students and offenders watched video-recordings and
judged the veracity of the presented statements.
N =20 males (n.m.
/students)
(liars/truth-tellers)
N =76 males
Offenders
(29.7 years)
N =43 males
(25.2 years)
No signicant correlations between DT and
classication accuracy (all p >.35), judgement
condence (all p >.06) and correct beliefs about
deception (all p >.35)
Offenders had higher levels of N (F =7.21, p <.008),
M (F =6.96, p <.009) and P (F =53.05, p <.001) and
both groups showed an equally strong truth bias (n.
m.)
Condence in own judgement was negatively
correlated with classication accuracy (r = − 0.23*)
and messages judged as true (r =0.24*)
Deception production and deception detection
Wright et al.
(2015)
Dark Triad
(NPI-16)
(MACH-IV)
(SRP-SF)
Deception production and detection
Computer administered deceptive interactive task
DeceIT, participants took turns making true or false
20–30 s verbal statements.
While each participant completed 80 trials in the role
of Sender, the rest of the participants were lie
Detectors.
Self-deception subscale (BIDR)
Lie acceptability (RLAS)
N =75
28 males
47 females
(27.2 years)
DT traits were unrelated to the ability to produce lies
which others found difcult to discriminate from the
truth (deception production), or to discriminate truth
from lies when judging others (deception detection).
- M was correlated with Lie acceptability (r =0.38**)
- N was correlated with Self-deception (r =0.25*)
- Lie Acceptability was correlated with deception
production (r = − 0.24*).
(Semrad and
Scott-Parker,
(2020)
Dark Triad
(SD3)
Deception production and detection
Face to face DeceIT task, in which the participant
(Sender) speaks (either the truth or a lie, depending on
the card instruction) for approximately 20 s,
attempting to convince other participants that it
reects their true opinion. Rest of participants: lie
Detectors
N =50
Australian
Federal Police
recruits
(30.2 years)
No signicant relationships were found between any
DT measure and neither truth nor lie production.
Elaad et al.
(2020)
Narcissism
(NPI
with 3 subscales:
- LA
- GE
- EE)
(LTAAS)
Successful lie-telling
Convincing truth-telling
Successful lie-detecting
Believing other people
Deception production
A modied version of the original ultimatum game
which manipulates deception, where participants were
requested to deceive another to gain more points
N =70
From which
42 males
28 females
(24.6 years)
- The lie-telling ability assessment was the only
signicant predictor of deception production (β =
0.45, t =3.38, p =.001)
- All three N dimensions predicted deception.
- LA contributed to self-assessed lie-telling (β =0.29, t
=2.54, p =.012), lie-detecting (β =0.29, t =4.26, p
<.001) and truth-telling (β =0.40, t =3.64, p <.001)
but not to truth-detecting ability
- GE contributed to self-assessed lie-telling (β =0.40,
t =3.60, p =.001), lie-detecting (β =0.47, t =4.47, p
<.001) and truth-telling (β =0.38, t =3.44, p <.001)
but not to truth-detecting ability
- EE contributed to self-assessed lie-telling (β =0.31, t
=2.76, p =.007), lie-detecting (β =0.40, t =3.67, p
<.001) and truth-telling (β =0.45, t =4.21, p <.001)
but not to truth-detecting ability
Note: * p <.05. ** p <.01, *** p <.001, n. s. =not signicant, n.m. =not mentioned.
Personality: N =Narcissism, M =Machiavellianism, P =Psychopathy, S =Sadism, SD3 =The D3 Short (Paulhus & Williams, 2002) SDT-3 =Short Dark Triad (Jones &
Paulhus, 2014), NPI =Narcissistic Personality Inventory, with three subscales: LA – Leadership/Authority, GE - Grandiose Exhibitionism, EE – Entitlement/Explo-
siveness (Raskin & Terry, 1988), NARQ =Narcissistic Admiration and Rivalry Questionnaire (Back et al., 2013), WAIS-IV =Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale – Fourth
Edition (Petermann, 2012), Resick =eight adjectives descriptive of Narcissism (arrogant, assertive, boastful, conceited, egotistical, self-centered, show-off, and
temperamental) (Resick et al., 2009), NPI-16 =Narcissistic Personality Inventory (Ames et al., 2006), SINS =Single-Item Narcissism Scale (Van der Linden &
Rosenthal, 2016), MACH-IV =Machiavellianism Scale Version IV (Christie & Geis, 1970), MACH-IV =Machiavellianism Scale VI (Jones & Paulhus, 2009), SPR-4 =
The Self-report Psychopathy Scale – Forth Edition (Paulhus et al., 2016), SRP-III =Self-Report Psychopathy Scale-III (Paulhus et al., 2009), SRP-SF =Sub-Clinical Self-
Report Psychopathy Questionnaire Short-Form (Paulhus et al., 2016); BIDR (Self-Deception Scale of the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding, Paulhus & Reid,
1991).
Deception: DeceIT =The Deceptive Interactive Task (Wright et al., 2012), LTAAS =Lie-truth ability assessment scale (Elaad, 2009, 2015).
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
9
production performances, measured separately (Wright et al., 2015) and
as a unitary construct (using SDT-3, Semrad & Scott-Parker, 2020), in
both general and prison populations (Schindler et al., 2019), meaning
that individuals scoring high on DT were not better liars, although they
frequently engaged in lie production and appealed to unethical strate-
gies to achieve their goals.
Investigated separately, all dimensions of Narcissism predicted lie
telling (Elaad et al., 2020) and three inter-correlated measurement tools
for Narcissism related differently to deception production, cheating and
willingness to steal (O’Reilly & Doerr, 2020), suggesting that personality
assessment tools may inuence the identied differences in deception
detection.
There is only one study assessing Machiavellianism as a separate
dimension, showing that individuals with higher levels of Machiavel-
lianism were more successful in producing convincing lies than those
with low levels (DePaulo & Rosenthal, 1979), but did not differ in
producing truthful statements. Also, they were more skilled in producing
successful lies about people they liked, compared to those who did not.
One explanation might be their preference for white lies and their
theatrical style, when deceiving (Jonason et al., 2014).
When Psychopathy was assessed with PPI-R, no correlations were
observed between Psychopathy and lie production (Martin & Leach,
2013), compared to SRP-4, where a positive association was found be-
tween the antisocial aspects of the construct and lie telling (Michels
et al., 2020). Since there were different measurement tools, it is unclear
whether the signicant association is attributable to Psychopathy’s
measurement tool or to the individual differences in deception
production.
5.2. Deception detection
Two studies investigate DT’s perceptions on deception detection
skills, and most of the literature focused on investigating deception
production. As observed, individuals scoring high on Narcissism and
Psychopathy perceived themselves better at successfully detecting lies,
but not those scoring high on Machiavellianism (Wissing & Reinhard,
2019). In case of Narcissism, results replicated when assessed as a
separate construct, documenting a positive association between
Narcissism, self-rated lie detecting ability, and increased condence in
their lie detection skills (Zvi & Elaad, 2018).
When deception detection performances were assessed with experi-
mental tasks, in face-to-face interaction, Wright et al. (2015) failed to
nd a correlation between DT and increased deception detection per-
formance (assessing personality with separate instruments: NPI, MACH-
IV, SRP-III), similar to (Semrad and Scott-Parker, (2020) who assessed
DT traits as a unitary construct (SD-3). Contrary to these results, when
judging high stakes deceptive statements, males scoring low on
Narcissism and women scoring high on Machiavellianism, proved to be
better at deception detection (Lyons et al., 2017). A possible explanation
in this regard may be that less self-centered and more strategic approach
benets when judging the emotional appeals of missing persons (Lyons
et al., 2017). When Machiavellianism was investigated as a separate
construct, individuals scoring low and high did not differ in the self-
reported detection accuracy rate (Geis & Moon, 1981).
The only two studies investigating the link between Psychopathy and
deception detection obtained divergent results. When personality traits
were measured with the PPI-R, no signicant correlation was found
between Psychopathy and deception detection performances (Martin &
Leach, 2013). However, there was a positive association between par-
ticipant’s condence and performance in lie detection. When person-
ality was assessed with SRP-III (designed for sub-clinical Psychopathy,
in normal population), Primary Psychopathy positively correlated with
deception detection in men (Lyons et al., 2013), supporting the idea that
Primary Psychopathy is a male-typical adaptation strategy (Jonason
et al., 2009).
6. Conclusions
Deception is part of our everyday life, and while many use it to
protect the ones they care about, others use it to protect/benet them-
selves, regardless of the costs for those around them. In addition to their
frequent use, they even report enjoying it. These are the “few prolic
liars” (Daiku et al., 2021), mainly responsible for the most lies being
reported. A possible explanation for the use of deception either for
altruistic or self-serving purposes, might lay in an individual’s person-
ality structure.
As recently shown, some dark personality traits, such as Narcissism,
Machiavellianism and Psychopathy, are frequently associated with a
wide range of unethical behaviors (Moshagen et al., 2018). For this
reason, the current study, aimed to bring together their deception
related perceptions, regarding lie frequency, willingness, propensity to
lie, context preference, motivations, and their actual deception pro-
duction/detection performances observed in experimental tasks. Pre-
senting the similarities and discrepancies between self-assessed and
observed performances indirectly explains the value of studying DT in
relation to deception and why studying the typical personality is insuf-
cient to understanding the antisocial character of deception. One
argument in this regard is that low levels of Agreeableness (Ashton &
Lee, 2007) and Honesty-Humility cannot fully predict the commonal-
ities and specic differences between DT dimensions (Schreiber &
Marcus, 2020), which relate differently to certain aspects of deception,
as we earlier presented.
As a cautionary note, individuals with increased levels of dark traits
may inate their self-reported skills due to overcondence in their lie
detection ability (Wissing & Reinhard, 2017) and might have assessment
bias due to their self-enhancement tendency (Schwardmann & Van der
Weele, 2019). Although some studies documented DT members frequent
lie-telling and enhanced self-perceived efcacy in successful deception
(Forsyth et al., 2021), no signicant relationship was found between
deception production and DT’s observed performances (Michels et al.,
2020).Except for Narcissism, which was correlated with deception
production when studied as a single construct, in both self-report studies
(O’Reilly & Doerr, 2020) and experimental tasks (Elaad et al., 2020).
Considering their antagonistic nature, willingness to maintain a socially
desirable image, low stake deception and the social costs of getting
caught when lying, there is the possibility that individuals high on DT
might have refrained from lying, or chose not to obey the instructions.
When asked to detect deception in others, most studies failed to nd
a correlation between DT and enhanced deception detection, except for
two, documenting the importance of Narcissism and Machiavellianism
in detecting high-stakes deception (Lyons et al., 2013). In addition, it
was suggested that individuals scoring high on Narcissism have a ten-
dency to overestimate their deception detection skills (Elaad et al.,
2020).
Although we found no study investigating the DT in relation to FFM/
HEXACO models of personality and Deception in a unitary design, we
mention that the Dark factor of personality (conceptualized as D: the
core to all dark traits, including the DT members) predicts dishonest
behavior over all ve FFM dimensions (Moshagen et al., 2018). This
result suggests the possible contribution of DT, beyond The FFM of
personality and sustains the importance of studying the malevolent side
of human nature in relation to unethical behaviors, such as deception.
As a general conclusion to this scoping review, there is a growing
body of yet insufciently systematic empirical evidence documenting
whether high levels of DT traits might benet a liar or enhance accuracy
in deception detection. Additional research can signicantly contribute
to understanding individual differences in anti-social deception and
provide a more comprehensive picture.
One possibility to be explored in future research is the multidimen-
sional nature of the DT traits, given the existence of various factors (e.g.
Grandiose vs. Vulnerable Narcissism; Primary and Secondary Psychop-
athy), which remained uncaptured by current studies (Wissing &
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
10
Reinhard, 2019). For instance, because Primary Psychopathy was
associated with lie detection accuracy in men (Lyons et al., 2013), and
most self-report studies used the SDT-3, which mainly reects Secondary
Psychopathy and Grandiose Narcissism (Jones & Paulhus, 2014), the
presented ndings might underreport associations with detection
accuracy.
To conclude, an ideal way to study deceptive behaviors in relation to
personality would require using both self-reports and peer-evaluations
for the dark personality features and both self-reports and experi-
mental tasks for deception production and detection. This would allow
the researcher to compare participants’ perceptions and performances,
taking into account others’ perceptions of them while also controlling
for self-enhancement biases. In addition, to enhance the predictive
power of DT assessment over typical personality traits, it might be
helpful to study both typical (e.g. FFM) and aversive (i.e. DT, Dark
factor) personality traits, concentrate more on the associations between
subjective and objective measurements of deception, and focus more on
high-stakes situations or competitive social interactions and risk pop-
ulations (e.g.: prisoners).
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Andreea Turi: Theoretical framework, Conceptualization, Writing,
Reviewing, Editing M˘
ad˘
alina-Raluca Rebeleș: Methodology, Investi-
gation, Writing original draft, Visualization Laura Visu-Petra: Project
administration, Funding acquisition, Resources, Supervision, Concep-
tualization, Methodology, Writing, Reviewing and Editing.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing nancial
interests or personal relationships that could have inuenced the work
reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Liliana Hurezan, Andreea-Alexandra Bulbuc,
Simina Cacuci, and Roșca Andreea-Ioana for their feedback on the
various drafts of the manuscript. The writing of this work was supported
by a scientic activity scholarship within Babeș-Bolyai University,
Romania awarded to the second author and by a grant from the Ministry
of Research, Innovation and Digitization, CNCS/CCCDI-UEFISCDI,
project number PN-III-P1-1.1-TE-2019-1075 awarded to the corre-
sponding author.
References
Aamodt, M. G., & Custer, H. (2006). Who can best catch a liar?. Retrieved from Forensic
Examiner, 15(1), 6 https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2006-02487-001.
Ames, D. R., Rose, P., & Anderson, C. P. (2006). The NPI-16 as a short measure of
narcissism. Journal of Research in Personality, 40, 440–450. https://doi.org/10.1016/
j.jrp.2005.03.002
Arksey, H., & O’Malley, L. (2005). Scoping studies: Towards a methodological
framework. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 8(1), 19–32. https://
doi.org/10.1080/1364557032000119616
Ashton, M. C., & Lee, K. (2007). Empirical, theoretical, and practical advantages of the
HEXACO model of personality structure. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 11
(2), 150–166. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088868306294907
Azizli, N., Atkinson, B. E., Baughman, H. M., Chin, K., Vernon, P. A., Harris, E., &
Veselka, L. (2016). Lies and crimes: Dark triad, misconduct, and high-stakes
deception. Personality and Individual Differences, 89, 34–39. https://doi.org/
10.1016/j.paid.2015.09.034
Bachkirova, T. (2015). Self-deception in coaches: An issue in principle and a challenge
for supervision. Coaching: An International Journal of Theory, Research and Practice, 8
(1), 4–19. https://doi.org/10.1080/17521882.2014.998692
Back, M. D., Küfner, A. C., Dufner, M., Gerlach, T. M., Rauthmann, J. F., & Denissen, J. J.
(2013). Narcissistic admiration and rivalry: Disentangling the bright and dark sides
of narcissism. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 105(6), 1013–1037.
https://doi.org/10.1037/a0034431
Bara´
nczuk, U. (2021). The ve factor model of personality and sense of coherence: A
meta-analysis. Journal of Health Psychology, 26(1), 12–25. d0o.i.1o1rg7/71/
01.13157971/10353910958381495898475.
Baughman, H. M., Jonason, P. K., Lyons, M., & Vernon, P. A. (2014). Liar liar pants on
re: Cheater strategies linked to the dark triad. Personality and Individual Differences,
71, 35–38. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2014.07.019
Birk´
as, B., P´
atkai, G., & Csath´
o, ´
A. (2020). The mediating role of the dark triad between
life history strategy and perceived stress factors. Psychological Reports, 123(2),
252–265. https://doi.org/10.1177/0033294118818095
Bond, C. F., Jr., & DePaulo, B. M. (2006). Accuracy of deception judgments. Personality
and Social Psychology Review, 10(3), 214–234. https://doi.org/10.1207/
s15327957pspr1003_2
Bond, C. F., Jr., & DePaulo, B. M. (2008). Individual differences in judging deception:
Accuracy and bias. Psychological Bulletin, 134(4), 477. https://doi.org/10.1037/
0033-2909.134.4.477
Bond, G. D. (2008). Deception detection expertise. Law and Human Behavior, 32(4),
339–351. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10979-007-9110-z
Bryant, E. M. (2008). Real lies, white lies and gray lies: Towards a typology of deception.
Kaleidoscope: A graduate journal of qualitative. Retrieved from Communication
Research, 7, 23 https://digitalcommons.trinity.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?artic
le=1006&context=hct_faculty.
Buta, M., Visu-Petra, G., & Visu-Petra, V. P. (2020). A little lie never hurt anyone:
Attitudes toward various types of lies over the lifespan. Psychology in Russia: State of
the Art, 13(1).
Christie, R., & Geis, F. L. (1970). Studies in Machiavellianism. Retrieved from. New York:
Academic Press https://books.google.ro/books?
hl=ro&lr=&id=d5tGBQAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=Christie,+R.,+%26Geis,+
F.+L.+(1970).Studies+in+Machiavellianism.+New+York:+Academic+Press.&
ots=rjlMIHQCF8&sig=-GGSm9CNeJjqbdBMjxM1sXBronk&redir_esc=y#v=onepage
&q&f=false.
Cleckley, H. (1976). The mask of sanity. Retrieved from (5th ed.). St. Louis, MO: Mosby
https://www.gwern.net/docs/psychology/1941-cleckley-maskofsanity.pdf.
Coid, J., Yang, M., Ullrich, S., Roberts, A., Moran, P., Bebbington, P.Hare, R., … (2009).
Psychopathy among prisoners in England and Wales. International Journal of Law and
Psychiatry, 32(3), 134–141. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijlp.2009.02.008
Cole, T. (2001). Lying to the one you love: The use of deception in romantic
relationships. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 18(1), 107–129. https://
doi.org/10.1177/0265407501181005
Cooper, B. S., & Yuille, J. C. (2007). Psychopathy and deception. Retrieved from. In
H. Herv´
e, & J. C. Yuille (Eds.), The psychopath: Theory, research, and practice (pp.
487–503). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers https://psycnet.apa.org/re
cord/2006-11788-019.
Curtis, D. A., Levine, T. R., Hart, C. L., & Serota, K. B. (2021). Does information about the
frequency of lying impact perceptions of honesty? North American Journal of
Psychology, 23(2).
Daiku, Y., Serota, K. B., & Levine, T. R. (2021). A few prolic liars in Japan: Replication
and the effects of dark triad personality traits. PLoS One, 16(4), Article e0249815.
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249815
Daudt, H. M., van Mossel, C., & Scott, S. J. (2013). Enhancing the scoping study
methodology: A large, inter-professional team’s experience with arksey and
O’Malley’s framework. BMC Medical Research Methodology, 13(1), 1–9. https://doi.
org/10.1186/1471-2288-13-48
DeAndrea, D. C., Tom Tong, S., Liang, Y. J., Levine, T. R., & Walther, J. B. (2012). When
do people misrepresent themselves to others? The effects of social desirability,
ground truth, and accountability on deceptive self-presentations. Journal of
Communication, 62(3), 400–417. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.2012.01646.
x
DePaulo, B. M., Kashy, D. A., Kirkendol, S. E., Wyer, M. M., & Epstein, I. I. (1996). Lying
in everyday life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(5), 979–995. https://
doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.70.5.979
DePaulo, B. M., & Rosenthal, R. (1979). Telling lies. Journal of personality and social
psychology, 37(10), 1713. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.37.10.1713
DePaulo, B. M., Charlton, K., Cooper, H., Lindsay, J. J., & Muhlenbruck, L. (1997). The
accuracy-condence correlation in the detection of deception. Personality and Social
Psychology Review, 1(4), 346–357. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327957pspr0104_5
Dini´
c, B. M., & Jevremov, T. (2021). Trends in research related to the dark triad: A
bibliometric analysis. Current Psychology, 40, 3206–3215. https://doi.org/10.1007/
s12144-019-00250-9
Dye, J., & Solomon, E. (2021). Problem of cheating. In Encyclopedia of evolutionary
psychological science (pp. 6274–6280). Cham: Springer International Publishing.
Drouvelis, M., & Pearce, G. (2021). Understanding the link between intelligence and lying.
https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3898321
Eckerd, S., DuHadway, S., Bendoly, E., Carter, C. R., & Kaufmann, L. (2021). On making
experimental design choices: Discussions on the use and challenges of demand
effects, incentives, deception, samples, and vignettes. Journal of Operations
Management, 67(2), 261–275. https://doi.org/10.1002/joom.1128
Elaad, E. (2009). Lie-detection biases among male police interrogators, prisoners, and
laypersons. Psychological Reports, 105(3_suppl), 1047–1056. https://doi.org/
10.2466/PR0.105.F.1047-1056
Elaad, E. (2015). Covert Detection of Deception. In Detecting Deception: Current Challenges
and Cognitive Approaches, 315. https://books.google.ro/books?hl=ro&lr=&id=4brl
BQAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA315&dq=elaad+2015+deception&ots=4uASBGp-1
T&sig=rjj21UyR1sDJa4zR7mMMy_jWAsI&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=elaad%202
015%20deception&f=false.
Elaad, E., Hanania, S. B., Mazor, S., & Zvi, L. (2020). The relations between deception,
narcissism and self-assessed lie-and truth-related abilities. Psychiatry, Psychology and
Law, 27(5), 880–893. https://doi.org/10.1080/13218719.2020.1751328
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
11
Elaad, E., & Reizer, A. (2015). Personality correlates of the self-assessed abilities to tell
and detect lies, tell truths, and believe others. Journal of Individual Differences.
https://doi.org/10.1027/1614-0001/a000168
Erat, S., & Gneezy, U. (2012). White lies. Management Science, 58(4), 723–733. https://
doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.1110.1449
Ettinger, D., & Jehiel, P. (2010). A theory of deception. American Economic Journal:
Microeconomics, 2(1), 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1257/mic.2.1.1
Fehr, E., & Fischbacher, U. (2006). Group afliation and altruistic norm enforcement.
American Economic Review, 96(2), 217–221. https://doi.org/10.1257/
000282806777212594
Forsyth, L., Anglim, J., March, E., & Bilobrk, B. (2021). Dark tetrad personality traits and
the propensity to lie across multiple contexts. Personality and Individual Differences,
177, Article 110792.
Franck, E., De Raedt, R., & De Houwer, J. (2008). Activation of latent self-schemas as a
cognitive vulnerability factor for depression: The potential role of implicit self-
esteem. Cognition and Emotion, 22, 1588–1599. https://doi.org/10.1080/
02699930801921271
Furnham, A., Richards, S. C., & Paulhus, D. L. (2013). The Dark Triad of personality: A 10
year review. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 7(3), 199–216. https://doi.
org/10.1111/spc3.12018
Gamer, M., & Ambach, W. (2014). Deception research today. Frontiers in Psychology, 5,
256. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00256
Gaspar, J. P., & Schweitzer, M. E. (2013). The emotion deception model: A review of
deception in negotiation and the role of emotion in deception. Negotiation and
Conict Management Research, 6(3), 160–179. https://doi.org/10.1111/ncmr.12010
Gaspar, J. P., Methasani, R., & Schweitzer, M. E. (2021). Emotional intelligence and
deception: A theoretical model and propositions. Journal of Business Ethics, 1–18.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-021-04738-y
George, J. F., Tilley, P., & Giordano, G. (2014). Sender credibility and deception
detection. Computers in Human Behavior, 35, 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
chb.2014.02.027
Geis, F. L., & Moon, T. H. (1981). Machiavellianism and deception. Journal of personality
and social psychology, 41(4), 766. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.41.4.766
Gino, F. (2015). Understanding ordinary unethical behavior: Why people who value
morality act immorally. Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 3, 107–111. https://
doi.org/10.1016/j.cobeha.2015.03.001
Glenn, A. L., & Sellbom, M. (2015). Theoretical and empirical concerns regarding the
dark triad as a construct. Journal of Personality Disorders, 29(3), 360–377. https://
doi.org/10.1521/pedi_2014_28_162
Granhag, P. A., Vrij, A., & Verschuere, B. (2015). Detecting deception: Current challenges
and cognitive approaches. John Wiley & Sons.
Hare, R. D. (1985). Comparison of procedures for the assessment of psychopathy. Journal
of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 53, 7–16. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-
006X.53.1.7
Hart, W., Breeden, C. J., & Lambert, J. (2021). Exploring a vulnerable side to dark
personality: People with some dark triad features are gullible and show
dysfunctional trusting. Personality and Individual Differences, 181, Article 111030.
Hartwig, M., & Bond, C. F., Jr. (2011). Why do lie-catchers fail? A lens model meta-
analysis of human lie judgments. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 137
(4), 643–659. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0023589
Hartwig, M., & Bond, C. F., Jr. (2014). Lie detection from multiple cues: A meta-analysis.
Applied Cognitive Psychology, 28(5), 661–676. https://doi.org/10.1002/acp.3052
Hartwig, M., Granhag, P. A., Str¨
omwall, L. A., & Andersson, L. O. (2004). Suspicious
minds: Criminals’ability to detect deception. Psychology, Crime and Law, 10(1),
83–95.
Jonason, P. K., & Webster, G. D. (2010). The dirty dozen: A concise measure of the dark
triad. Psychological Assessment, 22, 420–432. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0019265
Jonason, P. K., & Webster, G. D. (2012). A protean approach to social inuence: Dark
triad personalities and social inuence tactics. Personality and Individual Differences,
52(4), 521–526. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2011.11.023
Jonason, P. K., Li, N. P., Webster, G. D., & Schmitt, D. P. (2009). The dark triad:
Facilitating a short-term mating strategy in men. European Journal of Personality, 23
(1), 5–18. https://doi.org/10.1002/per.698
Jonason, P. K., Lyons, M., Baughman, H. M., & Vernon, P. A. (2014). What a tangled web
we weave: The dark triad traits and deception. Personality and Individual Differences,
70, 117–119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2014.06.038
Jones, D. N., & Figueredo, A. J. (2013). The core of darkness: Uncovering the heart of the
dark triad. European Journal of Personality, 27(6), 521–531. https://doi.org/
10.1002/per.1893
Jones, D. N., & Paulhus, D. L. (2009). Machiavellianism. Retrieved from. In M. R. Leary,
& R. H. Hoyle (Eds.), Handbook of individual differences in social behavior (pp.
93–108). New York: Guilford https://books.google.ro/books?hl=e
n&lr=&id=VgcGZ5sCEcIC&oi=fnd&pg=PA3&dq=Jones,+D.+N.,+%26+Paulhus,
+D.+L.+(2009).+Machiavellianism.+In+M.+R.+Leary+%26+R.+H.+Hoyle+
(Eds.),+Handbook+of+Individual+Differences+in+Social+Behavior+(pp.+93%
E2%80%93108).+New+York:+Guilford.&
ots=kBF4aNSLvr&sig=v3AEk4N49YQtS5ZJxiU-PJTSOms&redir_esc=y#v=onepage
&q&f=false.
Jones, D. N., & Paulhus, D. L. (2014). Introducing the short dark triad (SD3) a brief
measure of dark personality traits. Assessment, 21(1), 28–41. https://doi.org/
10.1177/1073191113514105
Kajonius, P. J., Persson, B. N., Rosenberg, P., & Garcia, D. (2016). The (mis)
measurement of the Dark Triad Dirty Dozen: Exploitation at the core of the scale.
PeerJ, 4, Article e1748. https://peerj.com/articles/1748/.
Kashy, D. A., & De Paulo, B. M. (1996). Who lies? Journal of Personality and Social
Psychology, 70(5), 1037. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.70.5.1037
Kim, M. S., Kam, K. Y., Sharkey, W. F., & Singelis, T. M. (2008). “Deception: Moral
transgression or social necessity?”: Cultural-relativity of deception motivations and
perceptions of deceptive communication. Journal of International and Intercultural
Communication, 1(1), 23–50.
Klaver, J. R., Lee, Z., Spidel, A., & Hart, S. D. (2009). Psychopathy and deception
detection using indirect measures. Legal and Criminological Psychology, 14(1),
171–182.
Kleinlogel, E. P., Dietz, J., & Antonakis, J. (2018). Lucky, competent, or just a cheat?
Interactive effects of honesty-humility and moral cues on cheating behavior.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 44(2), 158–172. https://doi.org/10.1177/
0146167217733071
Knapp, M. L., & Comadena, M. E. (1979). Telling it like it isn’t: A review of theory and
research on deceptive communication. Human Communication Research, 5, 270–285.
Koehn, C. E., Fisher, R. P., & Cutler, B. L. (2018). Using cognitive interviewing to
construct facial composites. In Interviewing and deception (pp. 41–63). Routledge.
Lee, K., & Ashton, M. C. (2014). The dark triad, the big ve, and the HEXACO model.
Personality and Individual Differences, 67, 2–5. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
paid.2014.01.048
Lyons, M. (2019). The Dark Triad of personality. In Narcissism, machiavellianism, and
psychopathy in everyday life. University of Liverpool: Academic Press. https://doi.
org/10.1177/2158244018822383.
Lyons, M., Croft, A., Fairhurst, S., Varley, K., & Wilson, C. (2017). Seeing through
crocodile tears? Sex-specic associations between the dark triad traits and lie
detection accuracy. Personality and Individual Differences, 113, 1–4. https://doi.org/
10.1016/j.paid.2017.03.008
Lyons, M., Healy, N., & Bruno, D. (2013). It takes one to know one: Relationship between
lie detection and psychopathy. Personality and Individual Differences, 55(6), 676–679.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2013.05.018
Mahon, J. E. (2008). The denition of lying and deception. Retrieved from https://plato.
stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/lying-denition/.
Markowitz, D. M. (2021). Toward a theory of prolic liars: Building a prole of
situational, dispositional, and communication characteristics. Communication
Research. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/p3y4x. https://psyarxiv.com/p3y4x/
Martin, K., & Leach, A. M. (2013). Psychopathy and deception detection. Personality and
Mental Health, 7(2), 154–159. https://doi.org/10.1002/pmh.1215
Masip, J., Garrido, E., & Herrero, C. (2004). Dening deception. Anales De Psicologia, 20
(1), 147–171. http://hdl.handle.net/10201/8026.
McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T. (2008). The ve-factor theory of personality. In O. P. John,
R. W. Robins, & L. A. Pervin (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (pp.
159–181). The Guilford Press.
Meijer, E. H., & van Koppen, P. J. (2008). Lie detectors and the law: The use of the
polygraph in Europe. In D. Canter, & R. Zukauskiene (Eds.), Psychology and law:
Bridging the gap (pp. 31–50). Aldershot, UK: Ashgate Publishing.
Michels, M., Molz, G., & GenanntBermpohl, F. M. (2020). The ability to lie and its
relations to the dark triad and general intelligence. Personality and Individual
Differences, 166, Article 110195. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2020.110195
Miller, J. D., Vize, C., Crowe, M. L., & Lynam, D. R. (2019). A critical appraisal of the
dark-triad literature and suggestions for moving forward. Current Directions in
Psychological Science, 28(4), 353–360. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721419838233
Morf, C. C., & Rhodewalt, F. (2001). Unraveling the paradoxes of narcissism: A dynamic
self-regulatory processing model. Psychological Inquiry, 12, 177–196. https://doi.
org/10.1207/S15327965PLI1204_1
Moshagen, M., Hilbig, B. E., & Zettler, I. (2018). The Dark core of personality.
Psychological Review, 125(5), 656–688. https://doi.org/10.1037/rev0000111
Muris, P., Merckelbach, H., Otgaar, H., & Meijer, E. (2017). The malevolent side of
human nature: A meta-analysis and critical review of the literature on the dark triad
(Narcissism, machiavellianism, and Psychopathy). Perspectives on Psychological
Science, 12(2), 183–204. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691616666070
Navas, M. P., Maneiro, L., Cutrín, O., G´
omez-Fraguela, J. A., & Sobral, J. (2021).
Contributions of the dark triad to moral disengagement among incarcerated and
community adults. Legal and Criminological Psychology, 26(2), 196–214. https://doi.
org/10.1111/lcrp.12190
Nortje, A., & Tredoux, C. (2019). How good are we at detecting deception? A review of
current techniques and theories. South African Journal of Psychology, 49(4), 491–504.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0081246318822953
O’Sullivan, M., & Ekman, P. (2004). 12 - The wizards of deception detection. In The
detection of deception in forensic contexts (pp. 269–286). https://doi.org/10.1017/
CBO9780511490071.012
Oey, L., Schachner, A., & Vull, E. (2019, January). Designing good deception: Recursive
theory of mind in lying and lie detection. Retrieved from. In The proceedings of the
annual meeting of the cognitive science society https://par.nsf.gov/servlets/purl
/10101193.
O’Meara, A., Davies, J., & Hammond, S. (2011). The psychometric properties and utility
of the Short Sadistic Impulse Scale (SSIS). Psychological assessment, 23(2), 523–531.
https://doi.org/10.1037/a0022400
O’Reilly, C. A., III, & Doerr, B. (2020). Conceit and deceit: Lying, cheating, and stealing
among grandiose narcissists. Personality and Individual Differences, 154, Article
109627. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.109627
Paulhus, D. L., Neumann, C. S., & Hare, R. D. (2009). Manual for the Hare Self-Report
Psychopathy scale. Toronto: Multi-health systems.
Paulhus, D. L., Neumann, C. S., & Hare, R. D. (2016). Manual for the Self-Report
Psychopathy Scale ((4th ed.)). Toronto: Multi-Health Systems.
Paulhus, D. L., & Reid, D. B. (1991). Enhancement and denial in socially desirable
responding. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60(2), 307. https://doi.org/
10.1037/0022-3514.60.2.307
A. Turi et al.
Acta Psychologica 226 (2022) 103574
12
O’Sullivan, M., Frank, M. G., Hurley, C. M., & Tiwana, J. (2009). Police Lie Detection
Accuracy: The Effect of Lie Scenario. Law and Human Behavior, 33(6), 530–538.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10979-008-9166-4
Paulhus, D. E., & Williams, K. M. (2002). The dark triad of personality: Narcissism,
machiavellianism, and psychopathy. Journal of Research in Personality, 36(2002),
556–563. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0092-6566(02)00505-6
Peace, K. A., & Sinclair, S. M. (2012). Cold-blooded lie catchers?An investigation of
psychopathy, emotional processing, and deception detection. Legal and
Criminological Psychology, 17(1), 177–191. https://doi.org/10.1348/
135532510X524789
Persson, S., Harnesk, D., & Islar, M. (2017). What local people? Examining the G´
allok
mining conict and the rights of the S´
ami population in terms of justice and power.
Geoforum, 86, 20–29. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2017.08.009
Petermann, F. (2012). Wechsler adult intelligence scale: WAIS-IV. Pearson.
Pfattheicher, S. (2016). Testosterone, cortisol and the dark triad: Narcissism (but not
machiavellianism or psychopathy) is positively related to basal testosterone and
cortisol. Personality and Individual Differences, 97, 115–119. https://doi.org/
10.1016/j.paid.2016.03.015
Raskin, R., & Hall, C. S. (1981). The narcissistic personality inventory: Alternative form
reliability and further evidence of construct validity. Journal of Personality
Assessment, 45(2), 159–162. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327752jpa4502_10
Raskin, R., & Terry, H. (1988). A principal-components analysis of the Narcissistic
Personality Inventory and further evidence of its construct validity. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology, 54(5), 890–902. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-
3514.54.5.890
Rauthmann, J. F., & Kolar, G. P. (2012). How “dark” are the dark triad traits? Examining
the perceived darkness of narcissism, machiavellianism, and psychopathy.
Personality and Individual Differences, 53(7), 884–889. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
paid.2012.06.020
Reinhard, M. A., Sporer, S. L., & Scharmach, M. (2012). Perceived familiarity with a
judgmental situation improves lie detection ability. Swiss Journal of Psychology.
https://doi.org/10.1024/1421-0185/a000098
Resick, C. J., Whitman, D. S., Weingarden, S. M., & Hiller, N. J. (2009). The bright-side
and the dark-side of CEO personality: examining core self-evaluations, narcissism,
transformational leadership, and strategic inuence. Journal of Applied Psychology,
94(6), 1365–1381. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0016238
Schindler, S., Reinhard, M. A., Dobiosch, S., Steffan-Fauseweh, I., ¨
Ozdemir, G., &
Greenberg, J. (2019). The attenuating effect of mortality salience on dishonest
behavior. Motivation and Emotion, 43(1), 52–62.
Schreiber, A., & Marcus, B. (2020). The place of the “Dark triad” in general models of
personality: Some meta-analytic clarication. Psychological Bulletin, 146(11), 1021.
https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000299
Schwardmann, P., & Van der Weele, J. (2019). Deception and self-deception. Nature
Human Behaviour, 3(10), 1055–1061. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-019-0666-7
Semrad, M., & Scott-Parker, B. (2020). Police, personality and the ability to deceive.
International Journal of Police Science & Management, 22(1), 50–61. https://doi.org/
10.1177/1461355719880568
Semrad, M., Scott-Parker, B., & Nagel, T. (2019). Personality traits of a good liar: A
systematic review of the literature. Personality and Individual Differences, 147,
306–316. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.05.007
Serota, K. B., & Levine, T. R. (2015). A few prolic liars: Variation in the prevalence of
lying. Journal of Language and Social Psychology, 34(2), 138–157. https://doi.org/
10.1177/0261927X14528804
Serota, K. B., Levine, T. R., & Docan-Morgan, T. (2021). Unpacking variation in lie
prevalence: Prolic liars, bad lie days, or both? Communication Monographs, 1–25.
https://doi.org/10.1080/03637751.2021.1985153
Set, Z. (2020). Social malicious personalities: The dark triad. Retrieved from Psikiyatride
Guncel Yaklasimlar, 12(3), 318–329. https://doi.org/10.18863/pgy.629950.
Sip, K. E., Roepstorff, A., McGregor, W., & Frith, C. D. (2008). Detecting deception: The
scope and limits. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 12(2), 48–53. https://doi.org/10.1016/
j.tics.2007.11.008
Stewart, A. E., & Stewart, E. A. (2006). The preference to excel and its relationship to
selected personality variables. Retrieved from Journal of Individual Psychology, 62(3)
https://web.p.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=0&sid=5d
33ef19-6353-4fbe-8a42-caad4da84da7%40redis.
Tooke, W., & Camire, L. (1991). Patterns of deception in intersexual and intrasexual
mating strategies. Ethology and Sociobiology, 12(5), 345–364. https://doi.org/
10.1016/0162-3095(91)90030-T
Van der Linden, S., & Rosenthal, S. A. (2016). Measuring narcissism with a single
question? A replication and extension of the Single-Item Narcissism Scale (SINS).
Personality and Individual Differences, 90, 238–241. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
paid.2015.10.050
Van’t Veer, A., Stel, M., & van Beest, I. (2014). Limited capacity to lie: Cognitive load
interferes with being dishonest. Judgment and Decision making, 9(3), 199–206.
https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2351377
Visu-Petra, L., Miclea, M., & Visu-Petra, G. (2013). Individual differences in anxiety and
executive functioning: A multidimensional view. International Journal of Psychology,
48(4), 649–659. https://doi.org/10.1080/00207594.2012.656132
Visu-Petra, L., Prodan, N., & Talwar, V. (2022). Children’s lies: Intersecting cognitive
development, theory of mind and socialization. In P. K. Smith, & C. Hart (Eds.) (3rd ed.).
Wiley-Blackwell Handbook of Childhood Social Development.
Vrij, A. (2000). Detecting lies and deceit: The psychology of lying and implications for
professional practice. Chichester: John Wiley and Sons.
Vrij, A., Edward, K., & Bull, R. (2001). Police ofcers’ ability to detect deceit: The benet
of indirect deception detection measures. Legal and Criminological Psychology, 6(2),
185–196. https://doi.org/10.1348/135532501168271
Watts, A. L., Waldman, I. D., Smith, S. F., Poore, H. E., & Lilienfeld, S. O. (2017). The
nature and correlates of the dark triad: The answers depend on the questions. Journal
of Abnormal Psychology, 126(7), 951–968. https://doi.org/10.1037/abn0000296
Williams, K. M., Paulhus, D. L., & Hare, R. D. (2007). Capturing the four-factor structure
of psychopathy in college students via self-report. Journal of Personality Assessment,
88, 205–219. https://doi.org/10.1080/00223890701268074
Wissing, B. G., & Reinhard, M. A. (2017). The dark triad and the PID-5 maladaptive
personality traits: Accuracy, condence and response bias in judgments of veracity.
Frontiers in Psychology, 8, 1549. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01549
Wissing, B. G., & Reinhard, M. A. (2019). The dark triad and deception perceptions.
Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 1811. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01811
Wright, W. C., Wagstaff, G. F., & Wheatcroft, J. M. (2014). High-stakes lies: Verbal and
nonverbal cues to deception in public appeals for help with missing or murdered
relatives. Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 21(4), 523–537. https://doi.org/10.1080/
13218719.2013.839931
Wright, G. R., Berry, C. J., & Bird, G. (2012). “You can’t kid a kidder”: Association
between production and detection of deception in an interactive deception task.
Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 6, 87. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2012.00087
Wright, G. R., Berry, C. J., Catmur, C., & Bird, G. (2015). Good liars are neither ‘dark’nor
self-deceptive. PLoS One, 10(6), Article e0127315. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.
pone.0127315
Zettler, I., Moshagen, M., & Hilbig, B. E. (2021). Stability and change: The dark factor of
personality shapes dark traits. ocial Psychological and Personality Science, 12(6),
974–983. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550620953288
Zvi, L., & Elaad, E. (2018). Correlates of narcissism, self-reported lies, and self-assessed
abilities to tell and detect lies, tell truths, and believe others. Journal of Investigative
Psychology and Offender Proling, 15(3), 271–286. https://doi.org/10.1002/jip.1511
A. Turi et al.
