Scientists are gaining new insights into what it means to have psychopathic personality traits—and how these traits shape everything from pain perception and sexual behavior to political preferences and hormone levels. Rather than being purely the domain of true crime documentaries or prison studies, psychopathy is now recognized as a spectrum that can be measured in the general population, with subtle effects on everyday behavior.
Psychopathy is typically characterized by traits such as emotional detachment, lack of empathy, manipulativeness, impulsivity, and a disregard for social norms. Psychologists often break it down into multiple dimensions, including interpersonal traits (like superficial charm), affective traits (such as callousness), and behavioral traits (such as impulsivity and antisocial tendencies).
While clinical psychopathy is rare, subclinical levels are relatively common—and research suggests they may influence how people relate to others, process emotions, and respond to rewards and punishment. The following 11 studies help illuminate just how far-reaching these traits can be.
A study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior explored how personality traits influence women’s makeup habits. Among 1,410 Brazilian women, researchers found that narcissism and extraversion were associated with higher and more variable makeup use, especially in social situations. Women high in narcissism, for instance, tended to wear more makeup on first dates or in professional settings, likely as a way to attract admiration or boost confidence.
But women scoring higher in psychopathic traits showed a very different pattern. These individuals tended to use less makeup overall and were more consistent across situations. Their cosmetic routines remained stable whether they were alone, at work, or with friends. This may reflect a lower concern for social feedback, aligning with psychopathy’s hallmark features: impulsivity, reduced empathy, and indifference to norms. The findings suggest that makeup, often seen as a tool for impression management, is used less strategically by women with elevated psychopathic traits.
In a study published in Communications Psychology, researchers found that individuals with higher psychopathic traits were less sensitive to pain and had trouble learning from painful consequences. Using electric shocks and a computer-based learning task, they discovered that these individuals were more likely to return to their initial behaviors even after experiencing discomfort.
This resistance to change wasn’t simply due to stubbornness—it reflected an underlying impairment in how their brains processed pain as a teaching signal. The researchers coined this tendency “belief resetting,” where people high in psychopathy quickly dismissed painful outcomes and reverted to old expectations. This may help explain why they persist in harmful or risky behavior even after punishment. While the study used participants from the general population, it offers insight into potential mechanisms behind the antisocial behaviors seen in more extreme cases.
A study in Biological Psychology revealed that people high in the “meanness” component of psychopathy show weaker brain responses when viewing faces expressing emotion—including fear, anger, and happiness. Using EEG to measure brain activity within 200 milliseconds of viewing a face, the researchers found that meanness was uniquely linked to reduced activation, even after accounting for other traits like boldness and disinhibition.
This early-stage dampening of facial processing may underlie the cold, emotionally disconnected behavior often seen in psychopathy. It suggests that individuals high in meanness aren’t just indifferent to others—they may actually process emotional cues less effectively at a basic neurological level. Surprisingly, this diminished response occurred across all facial expressions, not just negative ones like fear or sadness, indicating a broader impairment in social perception.
Another study, published in Translational Psychiatry, showed that different facets of psychopathy are linked to distinct impairments in learning. Using a realistic foraging task and EEG, researchers found that antisocial traits were associated with the belief that the world is highly unpredictable, leading to difficulty forming stable expectations from feedback. Affective traits, like emotional coldness, were tied to reduced learning from punishment, while interpersonal traits blunted sensitivity to rewards.
This study challenges the idea that all psychopathic individuals are uniformly insensitive to punishment. Instead, it reveals a more complex picture: some traits interfere with processing pain, others with motivation, and still others with basic expectations about the stability of the environment. These insights could help tailor more effective interventions by identifying which types of feedback are most likely to influence behavior depending on an individual’s personality profile.
In research published in Sexual and Relationship Therapy, psychopathy stood out as the strongest and most consistent predictor of sociosexual orientation—that is, a person’s openness to uncommitted sex. While narcissism and Machiavellianism were also initially associated with casual sex, their effects disappeared when controlling for overlap between traits. Only psychopathy predicted all aspects of sociosexuality: behavior, desire, and attitude.
This suggests that impulsivity, emotional detachment, and risk-taking—the core features of psychopathy—may play a central role in shaping short-term mating strategies. The study also found that traits associated with prosocial values (like faith in humanity or moral respect for others) had little influence once darker traits were taken into account. In short, psychopathy—not kindness or compassion—is what best explains an individual’s comfort with uncommitted sex.
A study in the Journal of Research in Personality found that individuals with higher psychopathic traits are less likely to punish norm violators when doing so is costly to them. Across a large online survey and a lab-based experiment, researchers found that people high in psychopathy were less likely to act against injustice unless it required no sacrifice.
Importantly, this lack of punishment wasn’t due to a failure to recognize unfairness. In fact, these individuals were just as capable of identifying wrong behavior. Their motivation to enforce social norms simply dropped when there was no personal benefit. This finding suggests that the moral disengagement associated with psychopathy is not about ignorance—it’s about self-interest. They may understand the rules but only enforce them when convenient.
A sobering study published in Research on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology tracked 332 formerly incarcerated youth over more than a decade. Those with higher scores on the youth version of the Psychopathy Checklist were significantly more likely to die before age 35—most commonly from violence, suicide, or accidents.
Even when controlling for other disorders like ADHD or conduct disorder, psychopathy predicted a heightened mortality risk. In particular, behavioral traits like impulsivity and irresponsibility were closely linked to shorter life spans. The findings suggest that psychopathy in adolescence isn’t just a phase—it’s a serious risk factor for long-term health and safety, potentially warranting earlier intervention strategies.
A meta-analysis in Psychology & Neuroscience reviewed 26 studies and found that psychopathic traits—particularly impulsive and antisocial behaviors—were associated with higher baseline cortisol levels. This contradicts some earlier theories suggesting that psychopathy is linked to a reduced stress response.
In addition to cortisol, the study found suggestive evidence linking psychopathy to higher testosterone and lower oxytocin—hormones connected to aggression and social bonding, respectively. While findings were mixed across studies, the research points to a possible hormonal fingerprint for certain dimensions of psychopathy. These biological links could help explain why some individuals are more prone to impulsivity or emotional detachment.
A study in the European Journal of Neuroscience used brain scans and machine learning to explore how psychopathy relates to structural brain networks. Participants with higher psychopathic traits showed both stronger and weaker connections in specific white matter tracts. Some of these connections—particularly those involved in emotional regulation and attention—also predicted aggressive or antisocial behavior.
The results support a dual-pathway model: one set of brain circuits impairs emotional processing, while another affects attention control. Importantly, psychopathy was not just linked to brain deficits—it also involved increased connectivity in some areas, possibly reflecting compensatory mechanisms. These insights offer a more detailed neurobiological map of how psychopathic traits might be expressed.
Research in the Journal of Research in Personality found that people who supported Donald Trump were more likely to score high on traits like callousness, narcissism, and psychopathy—and lower on empathy and compassion. These patterns held even after accounting for demographic variables like race, education, or income.
The study suggests that personality traits shape political preferences in profound ways. Trump supporters, on average, reported lower affective empathy and higher enjoyment of others’ suffering (a trait known as dissonant empathy). Meanwhile, people high in benevolent traits—like humanism or moral respect for others—were more likely to hold liberal views. The findings point to a deep psychological divide underlying political ideology in the U.S.
A study in Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences found that men—but not women—with higher psychopathic traits were more likely to report having more children. Among men, traits like manipulativeness, emotional detachment, and antisocial behavior were all positively associated with offspring count.
The findings support the idea that psychopathy may serve as a short-term reproductive strategy—favoring quantity of offspring over long-term parental investment. However, the study did not distinguish between biological and non-biological children, and future work is needed to explore whether these results hold in different populations or across cultures.
These studies collectively paint a nuanced portrait of psychopathy as a multifaceted personality construct. While extreme forms can lead to dangerous or antisocial behavior, even subclinical traits influence how people process pain, navigate relationships, and interpret social norms. As research continues, we’re likely to learn more about the biological, psychological, and social mechanisms behind these traits—and what they can teach us about the human mind.
