Dark Tetrad Test (SD4)SD4
~9 min · 28 questions · Free partial report
This test contains sensitive content. Results are private and not shared with employers unless you explicitly consent.
Twenty eight statements from the Short Dark Tetrad, the published instrument that adds a fourth trait to the three most tests stop at. Paulhus, Buckels, Trapnell and Jones (2021) built it to measure machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy and everyday sadism as continuous dimensions on which the whole population varies, in ordinary people rather than in clinics. The items are the author's own, used here verbatim in English and translated by NOESIS into the other five languages, and the psychometrics reported on this page were computed on these exact items rather than borrowed from a relative. Nothing here is a diagnosis: the article itself says brief subclinical measures cannot replace clinical measures of personality disorders. One thing is worth knowing before you start, because the name of the fourth scale promises more than its questions ask: most of its items are about watching, violent sport, violent films and games, a fist fight, and none of them claims any pleasure in physically hurting a person. If you have taken the HEXACO personality test in this catalog, the two fit together, and this time the connection is the authors' own argument: they place all four dark traits underneath the Honesty and Humility factor rather than beside it.
Machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy and everyday sadism, from the published instrument, read as positions rather than verdicts.
- Place yourself on each of the four traits with the published instrument rather than with an internet quiz, see which of them is doing the most work in your everyday decisions, read what each level appears to cost and to buy, and get the fourth trait explained by what its questions actually ask instead of by what its name suggests.
No signup required to start. The Partial Report is free at the end. The Complete costs $9.90, if and when you want it.
What this test measures
M
Machiavellianism
Strategic, patient dealing with people: planning ahead, managing what others get to know, choosing alliances for what they will be worth later, using flattery as a tool. In this instrument the items were deliberately rebuilt from an older measure of controlled manipulation rather than carried over from its three-trait predecessor, so the content is foresight rather than hostility. A continuous dimension, never a clinical category.
N
Narcissism
A settled sense of being someone, and a taste for the admiration that confirms it: expecting to lead, expecting to be recognised, enjoying the occasional turn in the spotlight. Of the four traits it is the one research links to better personal adjustment rather than worse. A personality dimension on a continuum, never narcissistic personality disorder, which only a professional can assess.
P
Psychopathy
Speed and distance together: acting before weighing consequences, pushing against authority and rules, ending up in situations that carry real risk, and feeling little of what usually follows. Most people in the general population sit at the low end of this dimension. A subclinical trait, not a forensic finding and not a diagnosis.
S
Sadism
Everyday sadism: finding other people's discomfort appealing rather than merely tolerable. Read the content before the name. Four of the seven items measure it vicariously, through watching a fist fight, violent films and games, and violent sport; the other three through sharp words and the sense that some people deserve to suffer. No item claims any pleasure in physically hurting a person, because the authors minimised those after finding they failed to separate the trait from psychopathy. The original studies also found a large, replicated sex difference on this scale, with men scoring higher, so raw scores are not directly comparable between people of different sexes. A continuous dimension, never a diagnosis.
Discover where you stand on each dimension.
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Answer the questions
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| Free and paid, side by side | Partial Report (free, always) | Complete Report ($9.90) |
|---|---|---|
| Interpretive text per dimension, generated from your answers | ✓ | ✓ |
| Raw score for each dimension | ✓ | ✓ |
| One-paragraph overview reading | ✓ | ✓ |
| Everything in the Partial, expanded to 3–5 paragraphs per dimension | — | ✓ |
| Percentile per dimension, compared to reference norms | — | ✓ |
| Inter-dimensional chart with accessible data table | — | ✓ |
| Applied recommendations: career, relationships, self-care | — | ✓ |
| Certificate with public verification and PDF download | — | ✓ |
- ✓Everything in the Partial, expanded to 3–5 paragraphs per dimension
- ✓Percentile per dimension, compared to reference norms
- ✓Applied recommendations: career, relationships, self-care
- ✓Certificate with public verification and PDF download
You only pay after completing the test, if you want to go beyond the Partial.
- ✓Interpretive text per dimension, generated from your answers
- ✓Raw score for each dimension
- ✓One-paragraph overview reading
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Payment via PIX (instant) or credit card. Access for 1 year. After that, the report stays visible in read-only mode.
What you receive.
Radar chart with percentiles. Illustrative example.
Executive Summary
"You present a profile marked by high intellectual curiosity and above-average conscientiousness, with moderate extraversion and balanced emotional reactivity. This combination suggests someone who seeks novelty in a disciplined way."
Illustrative example.
Scale analysis
The Complete Report details the practical meaning of each score in 3 to 5 paragraphs, personalized by your combined profile. It is not a generic text by range; the analysis crosses all dimensions to generate specific observations about you.
Applied recommendations
Practical recommendations by area (career, relationships, studies, self-care), based on your combined profile. Certificate with verifiable QR and PDF download.
Why trust this instrument.
The Short Dark Tetrad (SD4) of Paulhus, Buckels, Trapnell and Jones (2021): 28 published items in four contiguous blocks of seven, one per trait, answered on a 5-point agreement scale. Each trait is reported as the mean of its seven items, from 1.00 to 5.00, and there is deliberately no total score, because the source article reports and validates the four subscales separately and rejects the single-factor reading. Not one item is reverse worded, which was an explicit decision of the authors. Reliability is the instrument's own rather than a relative's: alpha between .75 and .83 across the four subscales in the two validation studies. There is no norm set: published means exist but come from Canadian undergraduates averaging 20 years old, so the bands are NOESIS curation on the raw 1 to 5 metric and never a percentile. Two things the report states before it interprets anything. The sadism subscale is largely vicarious by design, four of its seven items being about watching violence rather than doing any, because the physical items were the ones that stopped separating it from psychopathy. And the original studies found a large, replicated sex difference on that same subscale, with men higher, so raw scores there are not directly comparable between people of different sexes.
- Authors:
- Paulhus, Buckels, Trapnell & Jones
- Year:
- 2021
- Range
- α 0.75 – 0.81(4 scales)
- Average
- α 0.79(adequate)
Cronbach's alpha. Values above .70 are acceptable; above .80, good.
- Paulhus, D. L., Buckels, E. E., Trapnell, P. D., & Jones, D. N. (2021). Screening for dark personalities: The Short Dark Tetrad (SD4). European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 37(3), 208-222. Buckels, E. E., Jones, D. N., & Paulhus, D. L. (2013). Behavioral confirmation of everyday sadism. Psychological Science, 24(11), 2201-2209.
The theory behind this test.
Dark Triad of Personality
Framework grouping three socially aversive but subclinical personality traits that had been studied separately: machiavellianism (a strategic, manipulative approach to people), narcissism (grandiosity and a need for admiration) and psychopathy (impulsivity combined with low empathy and remorse). Paulhus and Williams (2002) showed the three overlap without collapsing into one another, which is what makes them worth measuring together. Jones and Paulhus (2014) later built a brief measure with equal coverage of the three, the operationalisation this catalog's adaptation follows. The traits are dimensional and subclinical: everyone sits somewhere on all three, high scores describe a trade rather than a disorder, and research has argued that what they share is, in mirror image, the Honesty-Humility factor of the HEXACO model.
Learn more about this theory →Target Audience
Adults who want the four trait scores from the actual published instrument: people who negotiate hard, enjoy an audience, recover from conflict faster than everyone around them, or watch things other people look away from, and would rather have a measured position than an argument's worth of labels.
Recommended ages: 18+
Questions the report answers.
Do you treat people as pieces in a longer game?
The seven items here are about foresight rather than aggression, and that is deliberate: the authors rebuilt this subscale from an older measure precisely to get controlled manipulation instead of hostility, which is what separates it from the psychopathy scale. A high score reads as patience with a plan: secrets kept, allies chosen for what they will be worth later, flattery used as a tool, conflict avoided because the person may be useful. It wins negotiations and it quietly taxes intimacy, because people can tell when they are being handled. A low score means you deal in the open, which loses a few contests and buys something schemers rarely get to spend.
How much of your engine runs on being seen?
This scale asks about being a natural leader, having a unique talent, being told you are special, expecting to be a star, and enjoying the occasional show off. A high score usually works, at least at first: confidence recruits attention and attention feeds confidence, and of the four traits this is the one the research links to better personal adjustment rather than worse. The bill arrives when the mirror goes quiet, because criticism, indifference or somebody else's turn in the light lands as an injury rather than as an event. A low score protects you from that fall and can undersell what you actually deliver.
What does your nerve cost the people around you?
Speed and distance together: diving in and asking later, fighting authority, trouble with the law, dangerous situations, and the certainty that whoever crosses you will regret it. In an emergency this looks like courage, and across the length of a relationship it can look like absence. Most people score at the low end, which is the honest baseline of the scale and not a lack of character. A higher score is less a verdict than an inventory of the places where impulse and detachment are making your decisions before you get there.
What are you actually being asked here, before you read the number?
Start with what the seven items say, because the name of this scale is heavier than its content. Four of them are about watching: a fist fight, violent films and games, violent sports, somebody falling flat on their face. Three are about words: that some people deserve to suffer, that you have been mean online for the fun of it, that you know how to wound with language. No item claims any pleasure in physically hurting a person, and that is a design decision the authors explain: the physical items were the ones that stopped separating this trait from psychopathy, so they were minimised. So a mid range score here says you enjoy combat sports and violent fiction, which describes a large share of any audience. A high score adds the second half, the part that has a target: the joke at someone's expense, the comment posted because it would land. That is the half worth looking at, and it is the half that costs other people something. One more thing the number cannot hold: the original studies found a large and repeated difference by sex on this scale, with men scoring higher, so a raw comparison between people of different sexes is not a like for like comparison.
Who benefits most.
The negotiator who always wins something
They leave every deal ahead and some relationships behind, and they have started noticing the second part. Four trait scores show whether it is patient calculation, plain confidence, a fast trigger, or simply that other people's discomfort has never registered as a cost.
The person who just got called a narcissist
The word arrived in an argument or on a timeline, where it means everything and nothing. Twenty eight published items make it discussable: a measured position on grandiosity and need for admiration, next to the three traits the accusation usually confuses it with.
The one who never looks away
Everyone else winces at the replay and they lean in. The sadism scale exists for exactly this and it is more specific than its name: it separates an appetite for watching conflict, which is common and mostly harmless, from the sharp tongue that leaves marks on people who did not sign up for a fight.
Frequently asked questions
Does this test diagnose psychopathy, narcissistic personality disorder, or anything else?
No. All four traits are subclinical by definition: ordinary dimensions of personality studied in community samples, on which everybody sits somewhere. The source article states plainly that brief subclinical measures of this kind cannot replace clinical measures of personality disorders, and research on subclinical samples has found little sign of psychological dysfunction attached to them. A high score means you endorsed more of those statements than most people who answer honestly. It is not a forensic finding, not a diagnosis, and not a prediction about what you will do. If a result worries you, that concern belongs in a conversation with a mental health professional, not in a questionnaire.
The fourth scale is called sadism. What do its questions actually ask?
Read this before you read your score, because the name promises more than the questions ask. Four of the seven items are about watching: a fist fight, violent films and video games, violent sports, someone falling flat on their face. The other three are about words and attitude: that some people deserve to suffer, that you have said mean things online for fun, that you know how to hurt someone with words alone. Not one item claims any pleasure in physically hurting a person. That is by design and the authors explain why: the items that best separate this trait from psychopathy turned out to be the vicarious ones, so they deliberately minimised physical sadism items. A mid range score on this scale means, in practice, that you enjoy combat sports and violent films. The theoretical distinction from psychopathy is about reward rather than severity, in the article's own words: psychopathy is indifferent to other people's suffering, sadism finds it appealing.
Could my employer see my results?
No. This test is flagged as sensitive in NOESIS, and sensitive results are never shown individually to an employer without your explicit consent given for that specific execution, which defaults to off. That is a platform rule, not a courtesy. The same reasoning is why we mark this test as unsuitable for recruitment and personnel selection: it is a self report of socially undesirable traits, which means it is easy to answer strategically, and labelling a candidate with a word like psychopathy or sadism is indefensible whatever the number says. Development and coaching with the person's consent is the furthest this instrument should travel inside a company.
Is a high score bad?
It is a position, and the report treats it as one. These traits persist in the population partly because they sometimes work: patient strategy wins negotiations, confidence recruits opportunities, nerve is useful when everyone else freezes, and an appetite for watching conflict is most of what a stadium is for. The same dispositions carry costs that are mostly paid by other people and in trust. Your report describes both sides of the position you actually hold. What it will not do is tell you what you are.
This catalog also has a Dark Triad Assessment. What is the difference?
They are different products and both are worth what they claim. This one is the SD4, the published instrument: 28 items written and validated by its authors, four traits instead of three because it adds everyday sadism, its own reliability figures computed on these exact items, and a recognised acronym. The Dark Triad Assessment is NOESIS's own shorter alternative, 27 items written in house on the three classic traits; it has no published validation of its own and its page says so, which is why no reliability figure appears there. If you want the instrument researchers use, take this one. If you already took the other one, its three trait scores are not invalidated by this page, and the two are not interchangeable: different items, different wording, different scales, so the numbers are not comparable side by side.
What is actually known about the SD4's numbers?
Internal consistency, from the source article: alpha between .75 and .83 across the four subscales in the two validation studies (N = 999 and N = 660), with omega in the same range. Structure: a four factor model fit with no cross loadings required, and an independent study of 3,975 undergraduates found strong measurement invariance by gender. Separation: the machiavellianism items were rebuilt from the Mach VI rather than taken from the older SD3, which dropped the machiavellianism to psychopathy correlation from .47 to about .31. Two things are honestly missing and this page will not invent them: there is no test retest coefficient published for the original English form, and the article does not report how the four subscales correlate with the long standard measures they abbreviate. Norms are the third gap. Means are published, but they come from Canadian undergraduates averaging 20 years old, so this test reads your score on the raw 1 to 5 scale with labelled bands rather than as a percentile against a population that is not yours.
Combine instruments for a fuller profile.
Each test measures different dimensions. The Integrative Chat crosses the results of all tests you complete, revealing connections no single instrument can show.
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The Complete costs $9.90, if and when you want it.
This test is a self-knowledge tool for informational purposes. It does not constitute a psychological or clinical diagnosis and does not replace evaluation by a qualified professional. The report indicates the AI model used in text generation.
Items reproduced from the Short Dark Tetrad (SD4) as distributed by its author, Delroy L. Paulhus, on his measures page at the University of British Columbia, where the SD4 is listed under the heading In the Public Domain with the grant "The following questionnaires are available without permission. Feel free to download and use as needed." The same page places other measures by the same author under a separate heading that does require his permission, so the absence of a restriction here is a choice. Source article: Paulhus, D. L., Buckels, E. E., Trapnell, P. D., & Jones, D. N. (2021). Screening for dark personalities: The Short Dark Tetrad (SD4). European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 37(3), 208-222. The English items are verbatim; the Portuguese, Spanish, French, German and Italian versions are NOESIS translations and are not the published academic adaptations of those languages.