Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39578959›Full record

ArticleJournal of personality2025

Measures of Subclinical Psychopathy and Everyday Sadism are Still Redundant: A Conceptual Replication and Extension of Blötner and Mokros (2023).

Christian Blötner, Sandy S Spormann, Miriam J Hofmann, Andreas Mokros

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Journal of personality, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
3citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

3 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Review
  2. Psychopathic Traits and Sensation Seeking in Young General Population.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026
    Article
  3. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Christian BlötnerChair of Personality, Legal Psychology, and Assessment, Faculty of Psychology, FernUniversität in Hagen, Hagen, Germany.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7415-4756
Sandy S SpormannChair of Personality, Legal Psychology, and Assessment, Faculty of Psychology, FernUniversität in Hagen, Hagen, Germany.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3626-779X
Miriam J HofmannChair of Personality, Legal Psychology, and Assessment, Faculty of Psychology, FernUniversität in Hagen, Hagen, Germany.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1460-0931
Andreas MokrosChair of Personality, Legal Psychology, and Assessment, Faculty of Psychology, FernUniversität in Hagen, Hagen, Germany.ORCID https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9706-0928

Funding

FernUniversität in Hagen
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

objectiveVarious psychological concepts with different names reflect essentially the same content. A recent study (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2023.112102) found short scales of subclinical psychopathy and everyday sadism to be affected by this so-called jangle fallacy: Latent factors of psychopathy and everyday sadism were almost perfectly correlated, the nomological networks of psychopathy and sadism measures were almost identical, and in some cases, core criteria of psychopathy were more strongly related to sadism and vice versa.

methodThe present research (Ns = 1076 and 507; self-report) is an extended replication of the aforementioned study utilizing long scales instead of short scales for both constructs and corresponding criteria that were more pertinent to their potential distinction.

resultsAs in the original study, the latent psychopathy and sadism factors were almost perfectly correlated. The nomological networks of the psychopathy and sadism scales were almost identical, with numerous focal correlates of psychopathy being equally or even more strongly related to sadism and vice versa.

conclusionThese findings corroborate the earlier findings of the jangle fallacy of subclinical psychopathy and everyday sadism, calling into question the existence of everyday sadism as a unique construct.

Indexed as

Antisocial Personality DisorderPsychiatric Status Rating ScalesSadismAdolescentAdultFemaleHumansMaleMiddle AgedYoung Adultconstruct validityDark Tetradjangle fallacylatent modelingnomological network

Identifiers

PMID39578959
PMCPMC12421711

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