Perceived Control And Childhood Maltreatment Predict Adult Anxiety And Traits Of Secondary Psychopathy In A Community Sample

Evidence suggests that psychopathy can be divided into two subtypes by anxiety. Specifically, low levels of anxiety are predictive of primary psychopathy and high levels of anxiety are predictive of secondary psychopathy. These subtypes are also parsed apart by intrapersonal, behavioral, and etiological variations. Additionally, negative salient events can serve as risk factors for psychopathy. Perceived control during stress-inducing events can mitigate or aggravate psychological outcomes. We recruited 389 participants through Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Participants completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, the Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Short Form, the Perceived Control Over Stressful Events Scale, the State Trait Anxiety Inventory, the Levenson Self-Report Scale for Psychopathy, and the Brief Locus of Control Scale. The present study aimed to establish a relationship between trait anxiety and psychopathy subtype; however, we were unable to replicate these findings. Further, we found that levels of childhood maltreatment and perceived control, significantly predicted adult secondary psychopathy and trait anxiety, while primary psychopathy was only predicted by perceived control. In a novel model, past perceived control provided an indirect path between maltreatment and secondary psychopathy. Results suggest perceived control as a vital predictive factor for psychopathy. They also indicate environmental factors for distinguishing psychopathy subtype and predicting secondary psychopathy.