Is there a more dangerous personality type than a psychopath? It turns out that scientists just discovered one, and it’s called dark empathy.

If you’re interested in the dark side of human nature, you’ve likely heard of the dark triad. The Dark Triad describes the three common traits of psychopathic, narcissistic, and Machiavellian personalities.

By contrast, empathy is the complete opposite of these dark traits. Empaths are sensitive, and compassionate, and can easily be overwhelmed by the feelings of others.

But recently, a new study suggests that some empathetic people may also share traits of the dark triad. These are Dark Empaths, and it turns out that they can be much more dangerous than an ordinary psychopath.

Definition of Dark Empath

A dark empath is someone who understands another person’s feelings and uses them to manipulate and take advantage of others.

Anyone who scores high on Dark Triad Traits will also share another common characteristic; A clear lack of empathy. How can the two intertwine and interrelate?

It is useful to know more about empathy in general if we are to understand dark empathy. Specifically, there are two types of empathy: cognitive and affective. Researchers believe that cognitive empathy is related to dark empathy.

Here’s why.

Cognitive empathy and the dark triad
There are two types of empathy – cognitive and emotional.

Cognitive empathy is the ability to understand a person’s feelings. Affective empathy is the ability to feel a person’s feelings about themselves.

In other words:

Cognitive empathy = know your pain
Emotional empathy = I feel your pain
Cognitive empathy refers to the ability to know and understand another’s mental state (eg, the ability to take perspective; see from another’s point of view), while affective empathy is the ability to resonate with another person (or situation) on an emotional level (ie , the indirect sharing of their feelings.” Heym, et al.

People can feel cognitive or emotional empathy, or a combination of the two. However, cognitive empathy is related to dark empathy. Perceptual empaths can know and understand what you’re feeling, but they don’t necessarily associate themselves with your feelings.

Cognitive empathy is objective and logical. They are often good mediators because they can see the emotional situation from both sides without getting emotionally involved.

On the other hand, emotional empathy is more subjective. If you’re hurting, so are they. They have the ability to completely immerse themselves in your pain and often experience burnout in caring roles because of this.

So what are the signs of dark empaths?

8 Signs of a dark empath

In the 2020 study, Heym et al conducted surveys of more than 900 participants, all 20-30 years old and about 30% male. Participants completed several personality questionnaires, including the Big Five personality, dark traits, and empathy.

They discovered that some of the participants shared dark traits along with enhanced empathy characteristics. They called these dark empaths.

The study mentioned several personality indicators associated with dark empathy.

They have a sly sense of humor
They love feeling guilty for you
They are emotional manipulators
They love to antagonize people
They are passive aggressive
They are very critical of themselves
They enjoy the discomfort of others
They get moody when other people are having fun
As a group, dark sympathizers possess many distinct personality traits.

Personality traits of dark sympathy

Extroverts are selfish

Although they are usually outgoing and find pleasure in social activities, their close relationships with family and friends are tenuous. Although they prefer social contact, they tend to be selfish and unreliable. They can be controversial to those around them.

Passive aggressors

Possibly due to the enhanced empathy factor, dark sympathizers did not score as high on aggressive behaviour. This does not mean that they do not engage in passive forms of aggression. In fact, they scored higher on subscales of aggressiveness, such as malicious humor and guilt generation.

The malevolent sadists

An empath typically responds to another person’s pain with sympathy and compassion. But this is not always the case. Experiencing these feelings sometimes results in the opposite reaction of sadism and pleasure in another person’s distress. For example, instead of sympathy, dark sympathy feels Schadenfreude’s sense.

Self-critical nervousness

All this insight into other people’s feelings seems to produce a person who is more self-aware and critical in the dark empathy. They are more prone to anxiety and stress than mild empathy. They are also more likely to think harshly of themselves and play the victim.

Emotional manipulators

Since dark sympathizers know exactly what you’re going through, it’s easier for them to manipulate you. They would never resort to physical violence, but their knowledge and point of view give them insight. They will only know which buttons to press that will cause maximum damage.

malicious jokers

You can tell dark empaths what kind of things they find amusing. Many of them have a dark sense of humor that goes beyond sadism. They are the ones who make prejudicial jokes at the expense of others. They will be the first to laugh if someone cuts themselves.

Should we worry about Dark Empaths?

So why is dark empathy so dangerous? Because this type of personality knows exactly how you feel, and uses this information to manipulate you.

Whereas a true empath feels your pain and wants to help, a dark empath understands your pain and wonders how they can use it to their advantage.