THE INFLUENCE OF DARK AND POSITIVE PERSONALITY TRAITS ON DYADIC AND INDIVIDUAL CREATIVITY

Abstract

The present study not only replicates Jonason et al.'s (2017) examination of the influence of negative personality traits—the Dark Triad of Machiavellianism, Narcissism, and Psychopathy—upon Creativity Valence; but expands this investigation to examine the influence of positive personality traits—the Light Triad of Kantianism, Humanism and Faith in Humanity, plus General Trust and Prosocial Motivation —between dyads. Specifically, I examine the influence of an individual’s negative and positive personality traits on the novelty, fluency, and valence (positive and negative) of ideas, based on a sample of 208 individuals (104 dyads) recruited through Prolific. Analyses reveal Machiavellianism as the only personality trait to significantly predict negative creativity in completing the Problem-Solving Tasks. Moreover, among dyads, the inclusion of at least one person with a positive personality trait significantly increased that dyad's likelihood of generating novel ideas. Unexpectedly, at the individual level, Narcissism and General Trust both were found to predict lower levels of creativity. Theoretical implications, limitations, applications, and future directions are also discussed.