High Psychopathic Trait Individuals’ Decisions to Empathize are Influenced by Power Dynamics

The lack of empathy associated with heightened psychopathic traits is commonly attributed to fundamental emotional and/or cognitive deficits. However, recent studies showing that psychopathic individuals are capable of normative empathy in certain contexts suggest their reduced empathy may instead reflect reduced motivation to empathize. To further evaluate these possibilities,158 university students completed self-report measures of psychopathic traits and motivations to empathize and performed an Empathic Choice Task which presented various social situations and asked them to freely choose to either empathize virtuously (for the target’s benefit), empathize non-virtuously (for their own benefit), or merely observe. Results indicated that psychopathic traits were unrelated to the overall frequency of empathic choices. However, post-hoc analyses indicated that the motivations underlying these choices varied as a function of situational power dynamics, and this was increasingly so for individuals higher in psychopathic traits. Specifically, psychopathic traits were positively correlated with virtuous empathy when targets were depicted in positions of power over the participant, but positively related to non-virtuous empathy when they were depicted in positions of power over the target. These results support motivational theories of psychopathy and highlight the strategic sensitivity of high psychopathic trait individuals to complex socio-contextual dynamics.