Members of right‑leaning parties prefer leaders with dark triad personality

Researchers surveyed 4,266 members of Britain’s main parties to test whether individual personality traits - specifically the “dark triad” of narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy as defined by psychologist John Rauthmann - shape what kind of leader people prefer. Rather than diagnosing disorders, the study used agreement with targeted statements (for example, “group activities tend to be dull without me” or “people who mess with me always regret it”) and asked respondents which leadership characteristics they admired (exceptionalism, willingness to manipulate, indifference to harming others) rather than naming real politicians. Results show a clear pattern: higher personal scores on dark-triad measures correlate with greater preference for “dark” leaders who display grandiosity, manipulativeness and callousness.

Party-level differences were substantial: members of Reform UK and the Conservatives scored higher on dark-triad scales than members of Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens, producing a psychological convergence between the centre‑right and the populist radical right. The authors argue this supports a shift to two-bloc politics in Britain, with consequences for tactical voting and seat outcomes - populist vote-share may not translate into seats if centre‑right and radical‑right voters coordinate. Tim Bale (Queen Mary) received survey funding from Research England; co-authors are at the University of Sussex and report no relevant conflicts.