The “true confessions” of female flirting artists that pop up from time to time in the media offer tales of seduction that range from the mundane to the unbelievable. Female flirting artists come in all shapes and sizes, and so do their routines. You might think you wouldn’t fall for these individuals’ cheap persuasion tactics because they seem so blatantly fake. As a result, you feel confident that you’ll know how to resist the next person you encounter.

Female flirting artists are generally interested in having sex in one-night stands or casual relationships. Researchers who study these short-term relationships tend to focus on their long-term mental health consequences (Bersamin et al., 2014). Those who conducted this research assumed that both partners were interested in keeping the relationship as short and sweet as possible. For example, in Bersamin et al.’s study of casual sex, the research team (of which I was a part) simply asked participants to report the frequency with which they engaged in casual sex. We then correlated these findings with indicators of mental health and revealed that casual sex was indeed associated with lower mental health.

The tactics people use to persuade potential partners to engage in a casual relationship are much less well-studied—although such strategies appear in countless disclosures by seduction artists. What sets seduction artists apart from other people who might seek casual sex is that seduction artists attempt to manipulate potential partners who themselves desire more permanent relationships.

In some ways, seduction artists use traditional tactics that fall under the category of persuasion. Whether you’re trying to sell yourself or a product, you rely on persuasion techniques any time you try to influence someone else’s attitude. You hope that by influencing someone’s positive attitude toward the item or person you’re promoting, you’ll change that person’s behavior.

Seduction artists have to influence people they’ve never met to like them almost instantly. These people rely on common strategies that others use to make a good impression, such as appearing attractive, charming, or successful. But unlike someone genuinely interested in a romantic relationship, a seduction artist just needs to appear like someone who is looking for love. These traits—manipulation, selfishness, and hypocrisy—are precisely those that appear in the personality constellation known as the “dark triad” of psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism.

Psychologist Peter Jonasson of Western Sydney University and psychologist David Buss of the University of Texas (2012) examined the characteristics of what they called “short-term mating strategies” used by seduction artists. They defined these strategies as those that attempt to engage the other person in sex but avoid any kind of long-term commitment. To do this, Jonasson and Buss suggest, the seducer needs to keep the relationship in the “sex zone” and outside the “commitment zone.”

Based on the idea that Dark Triad traits are particularly prominent in seduction artists, Jonasson and Buss took a two-stage approach to identifying the behaviors and personalities of these individuals. Interestingly, they went into the research assuming that, despite the stereotype, women as well as men can fit the criteria—and indeed, the study included a lot of seduction artists based on the self-reports the team collected.

In the pilot study that kicked off the project, Jonason and Buss asked 102 participants—all college students and two-thirds female—to describe their experiences with people who “sought short-term sexual encounters.” The 71 actions participants described ranged from abuse (verbal or physical) to avoidance (not responding to emails or phone calls). In between these two extremes, those who sought to keep their interactions as uninvolved as possible engaged in behaviors such as avoiding nonsexual intimacy (such as hugging), keeping conversations superficial, failing to introduce partners to family and friends, appearing to stall, or explicitly stating that they were only seeking short-term sex.

The short-term mating strategies the researchers identified in this first phase then became the basis for a rating scale that another group of participants completed in a second study. This time, the sample of nearly 300 students had a roughly 50-50 gender split. Participants reported their tendency to engage in acts consistent with the seduction artists and answered questions about their attitudes toward casual sex and their self-ratings of how good a partner they thought they were. They also rated themselves on their general personality, as well as the 12-item Dark Triad scale (“Dirty Dozen”).

Because participants rated themselves, they likely tried to present as positive an image of themselves as possible. Without independent observers also evaluating them, we don’t know how vile and dirty they were. However, one strength of this study was the fact that both men and women provided data. It turns out that female seduction artists can be just as interesting as their male counterparts. Based on the results, it also seemed that people weren’t particularly shy about admitting to their seduction behaviors.

The 71 actions designed to maintain relationships at a superficial, short-term level fell into two broad groups:

De-escalating the relationship to a long-term level.

Keeping the relationship sexual rather than romantic.

To maintain the relationship in the short term, participants behaved in ways that would avoid contact, intimacy, and integration with the rest of their lives (i.e., preventing their partner from seeing family and friends). They also sometimes behaved in ways that were abusive toward their partner, either physically or verbally. To keep the relationship sexual rather than romantic, those who used short-term mating strategies relied on alcohol as an excuse, told their partner that the relationship was purely sexual, and behaved in ways that let their partner know that they were interested in other sexual partners and would continue to do so.

Male and female seduction artists were equally likely to use tactics that would prevent the relationship from developing into a long-term intimate relationship, as well as to look for ways to keep the relationship sexual. But there were some gender differences: Men were more likely to use violence directed at their partners, while women were more likely to tell their partners that they were in the relationship for sex only.

In the all-important personality domain, seduction artists showed specific traits, including antisocial tendencies. As expected, they were also more likely to be narcissistic. But again, male and female seduction artists differed in some aspects of their personality profiles: Women who acted more manipulatively, for example, were more likely to be psychopathic. Men with high levels of Machiavellianism were more likely to adopt the tactic of not including their partners in their lives.

Emotional stability in general also played an important role, but it was different for men and women: Women who were more likely to engage in preventing the relationship from becoming intimate were also the least emotionally stable. For women, but not men, self-ratings of sexual opportunism were also associated with conscientiousness scores.

These findings suggest that many different strategies con artists use and that people with certain personality traits are particularly likely to use them.

To spot con artists on your travels, these research-based checklists can give you a head start:

Clear behavioral signs

Engaging in unkind acts such as verbal or physical abuse to push you away.
Avoiding physical intimacy other than sexual.
Unwilling to introduce you to important people in their lives.
Flirting openly in front of others.
Unavailable and unresponsive to attempts to maintain or establish contact.

Clear Psychological Signs

(Men) They only seem to care about what you can do for them, not how they can help you.
(Women) Delay, neglect, indifference, and lack of interest in meeting others’ expectations.
(Women) They appear unstable, anxious, stressed, and insecure.
(Both) They are overly preoccupied with their appearance, display excessive selfishness, and express feelings of entitlement.
(Both) They show a lack of concern for others’ feelings, not just their own, and express a lack of remorse for actions that have caused hurt or pain to others.

This list may not capture every aspect of every seduction artist’s personality. However, the research provides a start in understanding this common and painful approach to close relationships. With this information in hand, you’ll learn more about how to look for individuals who have their interests, not yours, in mind.