Organizational behaviour model in management students: The Dark Triad traits

Abstract

The paper touches upon the relationships between the psychological constitution of an individual and organizational behaviour of employees as a manifestation of the behavioural pattern shaped in the process of the university professional training. The research analyses the differences in the display of the Dark Triad (DT) traits in students of various specializations within the Economics and Management field. The research methods include the Short Dark Triad personality test by Jones and Paulhus, a comparative analysis of curricula and the content of discipline programmes, and the methods of descriptive statistics. The research results demonstrate that there is an association between the DT traits formed by the organizational behaviour model and the specialization, which confirms the hypothesis that there is a need for a differentiated approach to shaping the organizational behaviour model. The complete psychological DT profile indicator has the highest average “darkness” level for the Business Informatics (BI) students, and the lowest was found for the Financial Management (FM) students. Comparing the specializations by the proportion of students with “potentially harmful” DT traits and “extremely harmful general psychological profile” shows that among the FM students there are no persons with toxicity exceeding the psychometric norm. At the same time, the State and Municipal Administration specialization attracts persons with a higher narcissism level, and BI is attractive to students with an elevated level of Machiavellianism and psychopathy. The research has not revealed a statistically significant relationship between the manifestation of toxicity in management students of different specializations and the content of educational programmes for six semesters. The resulting conclusion about the presence of a relationship between toxic personality traits and the choice of the specialization by Russian students is consistent with the findings of studies in other countries. The authors believe that the management training programmes should include the disciplines that support the development of interpersonal communication skills and entrepreneurial thinking as key elements of the organizational behaviour model demanded by employers.