It would be quite obvious to say that maintaining any personal relationship with a person who can easily be ruthless, heartless, manipulative, deceitful, and unempathetic toward others is an extremely questionable venture. However, it is important to list specifically how psychopathic individuals manifest in relationships, as well as highlight some of their characteristics to support such a claim.
- Psychopathic individuals skillfully manipulate the feelings of others. To enter into relationships, they tend to resort to deception, demonstrating good qualities that they do not actually possess. Of course, to some extent many people are inclined to act this way, but psychopaths do so more intensely than others. They skillfully present themselves as attractive romantic partners, even if they are absolutely uninterested in “committed” relationships.
- Once psychopathic individuals get what they want, they can easily begin to behave cruelly. Psychopathic predispositions in a partner are the strongest predictor of long-term abuse in a relationship. Due to a dysfunctional violence inhibition mechanism, psychopaths easily ignore the suffering of their partners, except in cases where they can use it for their own manipulative purposes. For example, by manipulating fear, they may intimidate their partner, coerce them into sexual contact, or substance use. All of this easily leads to psychological trauma in victims of such treatment.
- In terms of relationships, psychopathic individuals more often prefer quantity over quality. On average, they have three times as many partners, but this occurs because their typical relationships are short-term, turbulent, filled with infidelity and jealousy; to keep partners, they resort to deception, manipulation, and aggression, which, of course, is hardly a strategy capable of leading to stable long-term relationships. Naturally, they are prone to risky sexual behavior, and their mental state is the root of a number of sexual crimes, including rape and serial killings on a sexual basis.
- Relationships with psychopathic individuals are usually rated as unsatisfactory. Among other things, their partners are more likely to indicate sexual dissatisfaction. Given that psychopaths often deceive, manipulate, cheat, or even commit violence against their partners, this is not surprising.
- As is well known, some people cannot easily leave psychopathic partners, even if they are completely dissatisfied with the relationship. This occurs primarily due to manipulation, suggestion, and threats. A person’s tendency to become attached to others over time may also play a role. Furthermore, a syndrome such as hyper-empathy can influence the situation, causing a person to feel sorry for their partner regardless of their behavior.
- Psychopathic individuals are prone to a form of relationship known as “sugar dating.” In these, one partner, who is wealthier and typically significantly older than the second, provides the other with money, privileges, status, and other material benefits in exchange for company or intimacy. Moreover, a willingness to engage in such relationships is linked to psychopathy regardless of which role the person plays in them. It was also found that dissatisfaction in relationships is caused not so much by the presence, but by the difference in psychopathic predispositions between partners. Obviously, a non-psychopathic individual will be dissatisfied with a relationship with a psychopath. But this can work the same way for the psychopath themselves. As researchers believe, people with high scores in “dark traits” (psychopathy, narcissism, Machiavellianism) are more satisfied in relationships with individuals like themselves.
