Nonetheless, building upon the work of Sleep and her colleagues, the test has risen in popularity in recent months thanks to social media. The team doesn’t actually label these traits as “difficult,” notes Joshua D. Miller, Ph.D., a personality researcher and University of Georgia psychology professor who supervised Sleep’s research, in an interview with mindbodygreen (Sleep was not available for comment). “We call it disagreeableness—it is a spectrum that spans antagonism to agreeableness,” he says. That being said, let’s break down the seven traits that the IDRlabs test considers difficult: Miller gives a good example of when aggressiveness might be appropriate and when it could backfire: “In my academic work, I could argue with people in my field and be disagreeable without a lot of trouble or costs—but if I behave that way at home and in other contexts in a pervasive manner, it would be closer to something we might consider a problem.” Notably, though, Miller doesn’t think risk-taking should be included in the list. “The paper that this is based on does not include risk-taking in this construct,” he tells mbg. “It comes out because other papers include it.” In their study, Sleep, Miller, and their colleagues sought to gain a more nuanced understanding of the structure of personality. Their research examined the structure of antagonism and was based on commonly used measures of pathological personality traits, and it involved 532 participants from a large southeastern university. Their findings demonstrated how antagonism unfolds as a trait at varying levels of specificity and intensity. One of the main points Miller emphasizes is that antagonist traits become a problem if they are fixed. “Flexible personality is healthy personality,” he explains. “You want your personality to shift to some degree based on the circumstance. If you cannot shift your personality to meet certain needs, it’s a problem. [In other words], if you’re difficult in every setting, it could be considered a disorder if the problems are pervasive, persistent, and long-standing.” GinaMarie Guarino, LMHC, a licensed mental health counselor at PsychPoint, adds that difficult people can often express that they do not care how their behavior affects others. “[Difficult people] believe it is OK to be careless with other people’s boundaries and will often reject responsibility for their actions and try to overpower others,” Guarino tells mbg. This is where radical honesty with oneself and willingness to change and be flexible is paramount. Furthermore, Miller notes that people could be difficult for a lot of reasons outside of the context of antagonism. “Emotional dysregulation could be ‘difficult’ for someone who needs constant reassurance,” he says. “There are a lot of reasons that someone is difficult. That doesn’t mean they’re an asshole.” So, in taking The Difficult Person Test, it is not necessarily helpful to be attached to your results or think that they are set in stone. Rather, it might be helpful to use the results as a friendly guide that can help illuminate areas within that you may not have been aware of or that may need adjustment. It’s also helpful to note that no matter your results, implementing flexibility and joyful effort in approaching personality tendencies is a robustly effective approach. On the other hand, shame and judgment never help with personal progress. According to Miller, narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy all share the tendency to callousness, ruthlessness, and the intense focus on one’s needs at the expense of others. “Psychopathy is the most pathologized,” he explains. “The combination of intense impulsivity and intense disagreeableness is the least adaptive and unhelpful in all settings.” (He notes, however, that he hates the term “Dark Triad” because he believes it misrepresents these traits.) Guarino expands on the three traits, saying “Narcissistic behaviors, such as an inflated ego and a sense of entitlement, can often be seen in difficult people. Machiavellianism is also seen in difficult people through patterns of suspicion, manipulation, and aggression. Finally, psychopathic behaviors are behaviors that indicate a lack of empathy for others, which can be seen in difficult people through impulsivity, risk-taking behaviors, and insensitivity and carelessness when dealing with people’s feelings.” According to Guarino, while difficult people may carry traits of the dark triad, they often are not intending to be difficult or may not be happy with their difficult personality. “Difficult people may not want to be this way but do not know how to get themselves out of their own cycles of difficult behavior,” she explains. If you want to address your difficult behaviors and learn how to manage and improve them, Guarino suggests that it is best to speak with a therapist. “A mental health therapist will help you learn how these difficult behaviors developed and what purpose they serve for you,” she explains. “From there, your therapist will be able to help you learn healthier coping skills and behaviors to use in place of your difficult behaviors that are causing stress for you and your loved ones.” They will also be able to teach you stress tolerance skills that can help minimize reactivity. Miller also emphasizes that you have to have the motivation to change first—no one else is going to do this work for you. It is oftentimes a painful journey to shift seemingly ingrained personality traits, which is why people doing this work are quite brave. Along with potentially seeking support from a mental health professional, Miller also suggests “faking it until you make it” in order to reduce or mitigate natural default behaviors. “Try to show warmth/regard for others even if you don’t feel it,” he says. “Express sympathy even if you don’t feel empathy—try to behave in nicer and less difficult ways and see if this is actually improving your life.” In seeing evidence of overall improvement both with relationship to self and interpersonally, motivation will increase.
