An Introduction to Sadism

Sadism is a psychological construct which has a relatively sparse amount of scientific literature.

This is odd as sadism as a literary construct has been under study for centuries. According to Meloy (1997), sadism is basically getting pleasure from someone else’s physical or mental pain or from controlling and dominating them. Sadists are also known as violent narcissists or malignant narcissists because they get pleasure from hurting other people and don’t seem to care that they’re hurting others (Meloy, 1997).

Currently, sadism is also considered to be part of the Dark Tetrad personality traits. These traits also include Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy.

So, there are two common traits of a sadist:

• Deriving hedonistic pleasure
• ‘Hurting’ another human being

Having understood the components of sadism, I will now extend this investigation. In the next section, the subtypes of sadism will be identified.

C — Developing evidence (on-going research reveals fluctuations on typology of sadism and inclusion as a personality trait) (see evidence framework)

Types of Sadism

Psychopathic Sadism

Sadistic Personality Disorder was added as a diagnosis with eight criteria to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM–III–R; American Psychiatric Association, 1987). To be diagnosed, a person had to meet at least four of these criteria. It’s interesting that none of the factors mentioned sexual sadism. Instead of that, they focused on dominance and power over other people.

This subtype of sadism pertains specifically to the assertion of dominance over other people and derivation of pleasure from that. Some examples of psychopathic sadism can be observed in serial killers like Jeffery Dahmer and Ted Bundy.

Nevertheless, whether it is explored in literary pieces like 120 Days of Sodom, or in scientific manuals such as the DSM-V, sadism does have sexual connotations. In the DSM-V, it is considered as a paraphillic feature.

Hence, the next subtype of sadism I am going to explore is of sexual sadism.

Sexual Sadism

The term sadism was originally used to refer to the sexual arousal that some individuals experience in response to others’ suffering (Krafft-Ebing, 1907). This construct is still assessed today, under the more specific term sexual sadism.

Longpré et al. (2018) assessed the taxonicity of sexual sadism by conducting a taxometric analysis of the scores of 474 sex offenders from penitentiary settings on the MTC Sexual Sadism Scale. Their findings indicated that sexual sadism presents a clear underlying dimensional structure.

Thus, one can be sure that sexual sadism is a separate dimension.

However, there are some major issues with understanding sexual sadism. First, as Marshall and Kennedy (2003) have put it, there is a lack of consensus. Scientists are divided over whether the fundamental feature of sexual sadism is controlling the victim, humiliating them, and/or causing them physical pain.

Others have argued that it is none of these. For example, Proulx et al. (2006) have stated that sexual sadists are in fact primary rewarded by the power they exert over their victims, and not the victim’s distress per se.

To put it in a nutshell, there is confusion over whether

• the infliction of pain gives this pleasure, or
• the exertion of power over the other person is arousing.

Nevertheless, there do exist some examples of sexual sadism; the BDSM (bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism) subculture and the paraphilic disorder, Sexual Sadism Disorder.

Everyday Sadism

Sadism was thought to be a diagnostic condition until not too long ago. A lot of the study on sadism was done in investigative settings, mostly looking at sex crimes (Mokros et al., 2014). More recently, though, it has become clear that cruel traits can show up in other situations as well. This is called “everyday sadism” to differentiate it from sadism in sex or crime situations (Buckels et al., 2013). The idea of “everyday sadism” was helpful because it shows that these traits are present in community groups (O’Meara et al., 2011).

This further allows researchers to study sadism in various functional fields of life. These areas could be business, politics, work-life and relationships

Millon’s Four Subtypes of Sadism

Psychologist Theodore Millon proposed 4 types of sadism. It is important to note that these are theoretical descriptions rather than established types (unlike sexual sadism). The main motivation for sadists, based on Millon’s model, is control and dominance rather than fixation on sexuality. These types include the following:

Spineless Sadism

This type of sadism involves people behaving in ‘petty’ methods to gain pleasure through dominance and control, often in an attempt to cover up for the sadist’s own flaws or insecurities. Such sadists use ways of control and dominance that are tied to their personal grievances, indiscriminately. They might exercise such acts towards people who are easy targets.

An example here could be of covertly narcissistic school bullies.

Tyrannical Sadism

Tyrannical sadists hold – or seek out ways to acquire – unfair power dynamics where they can exercise instrumental power over others and derive pleasure from their misery and personal elevation over the others. This type of sadism differs from spineless sadism in the way that it usually involves gaining pleasure from the pain of people who might even be equals or higher up in the social ladder.

Such tyrannically sadistic individuals could be people in positions of authority; for example, political leaders who gleefully humiliate opponents for no apparent reason.

Enforcing Sadism

Similar to tyrannical sadists, enforcing sadists find elation using instrumental power. However, these individuals do not seek power out to punish others, but rather seem to be content with exerting the social or instrumental power they currently hold. Instead of gathering power, they usually find roles which involve immediate punitive authority. Such sadism could prevail in sadistic guards or clerical staff that could use red tape as a way to enjoy power over the process.

Explosive Sadism

Explosive sadists are people who are impulsive and prone to extreme emotional outbursts. Such outbursts could bear resemblance to intermittent explosive disorder, but the key feature here is again of finding gratification in the outcomes of such behaviors. Compared to tyrannical or enforcing sadists, the explosive types are less preoccupied with using instrumental methods. Instead, their impulsive nature might actually act in clear detriment to their current social standing and could potentially lead to a quicker loss of instrumental power. This could end up reinforcing the cycle of explosivity, because of the instability their behavior produces in everyday life.

Explosive sadists could sometimes engage in acts of violence, such as observed in serial murderers, rapists, or even white-collar psychopaths who have issues with temper.

Relation of Sadism to Psychopathy

To understand the link between sadism and psychopathy, I will first explain the typology of psychopathy.

Millon and Davis (1998), through the psychodynamic approach came up with ten theory subtypes of psychopathy. These subtypes might be useful as a guide. However, they would be hard to study in the real world because psychodynamics are not easily defined.

Another problem is that it looks like a lot of the groups can be combined. There are times when these theoretical subtypes are too similar to help define accurate subtypes within psychopathy. However, factors that seem to be consistent with Cluster B personality disorders are taken into account (see bubble in previous section for a summary). For instance, a “disingenuous psychopath” is someone who always needs attention, acts friendly on the outside, has a vague personality, and is never reliable. These traits are also found in psychopaths, but a psychopath who shows all of these traits to the fullest may indicate a stable form.

In 1998, Millon and Davis came up with three more subtypes: the evil psychopath, the covetous psychopath, and the unprincipled psychopath. These all seem to have a lot to do with different parts of antisocial personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, and sadism.

E — Historical significance rather than empirical robustness (primary reliance on psychodynamic way of enquiry) (see evidence framework)

Here, we can see how psychopathic behavior can be a source of pleasure. This is especially in the case where the individual exerts their dominance over the other.

Difference between Sadism and Psychopathy

There is an overlap between sadism and psychopathy. Psychopathy is a part of the Dark Tetrad that has links to sexual sadism in both community and clinical samples (Baughman et al., 2014; Mokros et al., 2011).
In spite of these links, there are two types of data that show sadism is not very similar to the other negative personality traits.

Hence, it should be given its own name.

Let us look at these streams of evidence.

Low Correlation

First, the links to the Dark Tetrad aren’t very strong. For example, in one study, daily sadism was linked to psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism with r values of .31–37 (Chabrol et al., 2009). This indicates correlation. However, the correlation is not huge. Thus, it could be assumed that sadism is a separate construct.

Sadism Explains Antisocial Behavior Independent of the Dark Tetrad

In addition to the Dark Tetrad, sadism explains a different kind of antisocial behavior. This is true in the case of cyberbullying (Smoker & March, 2017). It is also exhibited in experiments involving blasting task opponents with white noise (Buckels et al., 2013), or trolling on Facebook (Craker & March, 2016).

So, sadism explains certain antisocial behaviors which are different from the ones observed in classical psychopathy.

Conclusion

Sadism is a unique personality construct. It appears to interact with environmental factors differently. Moreover, its combination with psychopathy or other dark personality traits produces unique outcomes. Hence, there is a need for sadism to be studied more individually. Studying sadism could indeed shed even further light on to deviant behaviors on social media.

Ultimately, by investigating sadism, we could end up discovering even more of the dark side of our personality.

References

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