The Antagonistic (nee Dark) Triad

The Dark Triad was a name given to the simultaneous study of three socially aversive constructs--psychopathy, narcissism, and Machiavellianism. Because we believe the word "dark" to be unscientific, unhelpful, and promote sensationalistic, we use the term Antagonistic Triad. Moreover, this name references the basic personality element common to all three which serves as the core.

Our omnibus assessment, the Five Factor Model Antagonistic Triad Measure (FFM ATM), is made up of our super short forms for the Elemental Psychopathy Assessment (, Five Factor Narcissism Inventory, and Five Factor Machiavellianism Inventory. It was developed to fix two major problems with existing DT measures--the unidmensional treatment of multidimensional constructs and shortcomings in existing measures of Machiavellianism. The FFM ATM provides total scores for each construct as well as scores for underlying factors. Instruments with scoring instructions appear below. Most recently, we have identified a robust lower-order, integrative factor structure within the FFM ATM. These factors are Antagonism, Emotional Stability, Impulsivity, and Agency.

Download the FFM ATM

Download the Elemental Psychopathy Assessment Super Short Form (Collison et al., 2016)

Download the Five Factor Narcissism Inventory Super Short Form (West et al., in press)

Download the Five Factor Machiavellianism Inventory Super Short Form (Du et al., in press)