Workplace Psychopathy

My PhD student Ryan Cook and I are currently developing/validating a novel measure of workplace psychopathic tendencies based on a the conditional reasoning approach.  

The Conditional Reasoning Test of Workplace Psychopathy ("the CRT" for short below) is designed to indirectly capturing psychopathic tendencies of individuals, without the test-taker being aware this is what the test is measuring. 

The CRT includes a series scenarios that test-takers must read. Each scenarios is followed by a question and four response options. Some options are associated with what so-called "justification mechanisms" that are typical of corporate psychopaths (e.g., impulsivity, social superiority, insensitivity). As such, depending on the response options chosen by the individual across all the test, their overall score signals lower or higher psychopathic tendencies. 

So far, over 23,000 individuals have completed the CRT, including university students, job seekers, and employees working in government and for-profit organizations from Canada, the U.S., the U.K. We have accumulated evidence of the CRT's effectiveness (i.e., psychometric properties):

Internal consistency: Test-takers’ responses to the CRT scenarios are coherent, demonstrating that scores on the assessment are reliable, as evidenced by KR-20 reliability values around or above .80 across studies. 

Temporal stability: Test-takers completing the CRT twice, with two weeks in between, obtain scores that are consistent and stable (correlation of .72 between the two attempts).

Item functioning: Statistical analyses using Item Response Theory demonstrate that the CRT-WP scenarios and questions are particularly effective at capturing high dark personality tendencies, and thus to be used as a “red flag” mechanism when assessing individuals. 

Construct validity: CRT scores are significantly associated with scores on other validated and established assessments of dark personality traits (e.g., correlations in the .20s to .30s with the TriPM, SRP, PPI-R, Dark Triad, Dark Tetrad at Work, Irresponsibility, low Integrity, or low Honesty-Humility).

Criterion-related validity: CRT scores are significantly associated with several relevant workplace outcomes (with correlations usually in the .20s), for instance: 

• Higher likelihood of engaging in counter-productive work behaviors (e.g., abusing coworkers); 
• Higher likelihood of engaging in cyber-loafing (e.g., gambling one during work hours); 
• Selfish decision-making, as measured via a version of the “dictator game”; 
• Less distress experienced when facing stressful dilemmas.

Faking-Resistance: Our studies have shown that, in contrast with other more overt and explicit (i.e., transparent) assessments of dark personality traits, the implicit CRT is fairly resistance to faking or cheating attempts. 

• For instance, in two studies, test-takers completed the CRT and then were told that it was not an assessment of logical reasoning. Yet they were largely unable to guess what it was truly measuring (i.e., less than 5% being correct). 
• In a second study, measures of socially desirable responding were significantly associated with overt assessments of dark personality (correlations in the .30s to .40s), but not with the CRT (correlation = .07). 
• And, in a third study, test-takers instructed to behave like motivated job applicants were able to meaningfully decrease their scores on overt assessments of dark personality (e.g., HEXACO, SDT, TSD-I; with effect size d ranging from .30 to .73), while they were unable to do so for the CRT (d = .04).
• Faking is only possible when test-takers are made aware of the true nature of the CRT and how it works. But we have been developing “faking-detection” items to remedy such situations.
• The CRT seem somewhat more faking resistant when using AI (LLMs like ChatGPT,  Gemini, or Llama) vs. self-report tests.

Applicant reactions: Across three studies, participants taking the CRT as part of a mock hiring process reported fairly positive reactions to the test (i.e., perceived justice and organization attractiveness scores around 3.5 out of 5). These reactions are largely unimpacted by providing more detailed feedback, but it is better to describe the test as assessing personality in general (rather than traits like psychopathy specifically).

Sub-group differences: The CRT shows very small sub-group differences in scores (e.g., based on gender, race, or disability status), with limited evidence of differential item functioning (DIF) in IRT analyses. Only slightly more DIF observed when comparing the English and French version of the test. 

Career interests: Test-takers with higher CRT scores are less interested in jobs/careers labelled as “realistic”, “conventional”, or “artistic” (i.e., correlations with relevant RIASEC scores around -.20). This is consistent with research showing that individuals with dark personality tendencies are less interested in jobs labelled as “boring”.

The current version of the CRT includes 22 scenarios. It takes about 15-20 minutes to complete. The CRT also offers the option to include additional scenarios/questions, which are “honeypots”. That is, they are designed to catch test-takers’ attempts to cheat or fake. 

Peer-reviewed publications based on our CRT can be found here or here.

The main version of the CRT-WP is in English, although French, German, Norwegian, and Chinese versions have been created too.

If you are interested in research collaboration or using the CRT for workplace psychopathy in practice, please contact us.