The relationship between parental behavior and the reproductive strategy of daughter is mediated by the development of machiavellianism personality

Abstract

Females who receive harsh, rejective, and inconsistent nurturing behavior from parents, are predicted to adopt mating strategies, such as short-term and unstable pair bonds with males. The speculation that, the rejective behavior a female receives during the early days, and their short-term mating strategy is mediated by the development of Machiavellianism personality, is not well confirmed. In this study, we investigated the relationship between parenting behavior, experienced by female college students (n = 168) in their early days, Machiavellianism personality, and behavior related to short-term reproductive strategy. The results revealed that, both maternal rejective behavior received by women in their childhood and Machiavellianism, have a relationship with the number of males that the female has ever romantically involved. Moreover, the mediation effect of Machiavellianism between maternal rejection in participants’ childhood, and the number of males romantically involved, was marginally significant. This suggests that girls rejected by their mothers developed Machiavellianism. Consequently, this results in unstable female pair-bonding with the males.

Keywords

• Parental rejection
• Machiavellianism
• Short-term reproductive strategy
• Female
• Psychosocial acceleration theory