Citizens in Democratic Countries Have More Benevolent Traits, Fewer Malevolent Traits, and Greater Well-Being

Citizens in Democratic Countries Have More Benevolent Traits, Fewer Malevolent Traits, and Greater Well-Being | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Article Citizens in Democratic Countries Have More Benevolent Traits, Fewer Malevolent Traits, and Greater Well-Being Craig S. Neumann, Scott Barry Kaufman, Leanne ten Brinke This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-5271494/v2 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Published Journal Publication published 17 Apr, 2025 Read the published version in Scientific Reports → Version 2 posted 3 You are reading this latest preprint version Show more versions Abstract Research suggests that the level of democracy among countries is associated with the characteristics of their citizens. A critical question is whether types of government (e.g., autocratic vs. democratic) are linked to specific personality dispositions among its citizens, and their well-being. We addressed this question with a sample of over 200,000 persons from 75 countries. Using structural equation modeling and a strong measurement invariance approach we tested the association between national government status (i.e., autocratic, hybrid, flawed democracy, full democracy) and citizens display of socially aversive (malevolent) versus affiliative (benevolent) dispositional traits. As governments varied from autocratic to full democracy there were lower malevolent traits and higher benevolent traits. Further, established quantitative democracy indices predicted higher benevolent and lower malevolent traits, while only benevolent traits were strongly related to well-being. The findings highlight links between governments and the personality among citizens and how democratic practices influence well-being. Full Text Supplementary Files SupplementaryMaterial.pdf Cite Share Download PDF Status: Published Journal Publication published 17 Apr, 2025 Read the published version in Scientific Reports → Version 2 posted Editorial decision: Revision requested 20 Mar, 2025 Submission checks completed at journal 01 Mar, 2025 First submitted to journal 27 Feb, 2025 You are reading this latest preprint version Show more versions Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. 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