Students, sex, and psychopathy: Borderline and psychopathy personality traits are differently related to women and men's use of sexual coercion, partner poaching, and promiscuity

Abstract

Primary psychopathy traits correlate with sexual coercion, mate poaching, and lack of relationship exclusivity, reflecting instrumental use of others to fulfil personal desires. These sexual behaviors can also be explained by sexual thrill-seeking/impulsivity, or striving for relationship intimacy through fear of abandonment. Given that impulsive thrill-seeking and rejection-avoidance are related to secondary psychopathy and Borderline Personality Disorder, respectively, this study is the first to consider the independent effects of psychopathic traits versus Borderline Personality Disorder traits on sexual behaviors in a non-clinical mixed sex university student (N = 187) sample. Results broadly support our sexual behavior dissociation hypothesis: Unique relationships were identified between primary psychopathy traits and use of non-violent sexual coercive tactics (for women), reduced relationship exclusivity terms, and increased likelihood of mate poaching, whereas Borderline Personality Disorder traits showed an independent relationship with increased likelihood of sexual coercion (for men) and having lost a partner through poaching. These opposite experiences of mate poaching, along with the unique association between psychologically manipulative sexual coercion and primary psychopathy, are considered here in terms of their ‘fit’ with clinical equivalents.