Coauthored with the Clearer Thinking team and cross-posted from the Clearer Thinking blog.
We recently conducted qualitative research by crowd-sourcing over 100 open-ended responses to the question:
“What signs do you look for that help you identify people who are likely to be untrustworthy or who are likely to hurt you if they become your close friend or partner?”
We thought the answers contained some insights that may help you to identify people with whom it would be risky to get too close.
Here is a summary of the common themes that our respondents suggested as potential red flags or warning signs for an untrustworthy or harmful person:
1. Manipulation: This takes many forms, including guilt trips, gaslighting, peer pressure, negging, emotional blackmail, and a variety of more subtle behaviors, such as when someone is excessively nice early in a relationship in a way that is not congruent with their underlying personality. These are attempts to control or influence others without being straightforwardly coercive and without appealing to rational persuasion.
2. Inconsistency and Dishonesty: This includes inconsistencies in narratives they tell and dishonesty, but also more subtle forms of deception (such as repeated small untruths and inconsistencies between words and actions) or a lack of continuity in self-presentation over time. This can also include describing projects, connections, or behaviors in grandiose ways that are detached from reality.
3. Self-Centeredness: This includes a lack of awareness or care regarding the impact of their actions on others, with a focus just on how situations impact themselves. This self-centeredness can also appear as an over-concern with outward appearances (or how situations make them look), frequent bragging, an excessive focus on seeking attention, and the tendency to only talk about themselves without inquiring about others.
4. Anger: Everyone experiences anger sometimes, but frequent, uncontrolled, or unexpected anger tends to be seen as a red flag. Similarly, approval of vengeful or vindictive behavior (or engagement in these behaviors) can be problematic.
5. Lack of Empathy: A lack of empathy for the suffering of others or an absence of kindness in words or actions can signal that someone is more likely to harm you if you become close friends with them or enter into a relationship with them.
6. Extreme Emotionality: This refers to emotional instability or extreme mood swings. It is even more problematic when accompanied by blaming others for their emotional reactions, especially when those reactions are highly inappropriate (given the circumstances). Extreme emotional reasoning can cause people to become detached from reality (e.g., “Since I feel angry, you must have seriously wronged me!” or “Since I feel anxious, you must be threatening me!”).
7. Avoidance and Poor Communication: It can be difficult to be close to someone who is extremely avoidant of conflict, who hides intense negative feelings that they experience (e.g., pretending not to be angry when they are furious), or who has poor communication skills, especially when resolving issues or conflicts.
8. Lack of Responsibility and Accountability: This includes impulsivity, recklessness, a lack of consideration for others’ safety, an inability to take responsibility after making mistakes, failing to follow through on commitments, or blaming others for their own shortcomings. This can also include serious addiction issues that they are not seeking treatment for, constantly identifying as a victim of their circumstances while not taking responsibility for their role, and projecting personal issues onto others (or lacking self-awareness of their serious faults).
9. Poor Handling of Their Other Relationships: It can be offputting if someone seems unable to healthily handle other relationships in their life or if they treat people poorly if they disagree with or dislike them. Other behaviors, such as asking to borrow money from someone early in a relationship with them, may reflect a lack of common sense or a general inability to navigate relationships in a healthy way.
10. Negative Talk and Gossip: It does not bode well when someone often speaks negatively of others, especially as a source of entertainment or habitual gossiping. This can include talking badly about past associates or partners, such as saying that all their exes were “crazy.”
11. Judgmentalness: Signs of judgmentalness could include passing harsh negative judgments of others based on little information or being very critical or judgmental of other people’s minor faults.
Please note that these traits and behaviors are a summary of over 100 people’s views, not our personal opinions and not professional advice. If you’re concerned that you might be in an abusive relationship, we strongly encourage you to seek support. Seeking help is a brave and important step toward ensuring your safety and well-being. Remember, you’re not alone, and there are resources and people ready to assist you.
If you are in a relationship that you want to improve, we have a few free tools that might help:
- Kind And Effective Communication (15 Minutes): Learn and practice principles of non-violent communication to build stronger relationships, resolve conflicts, and improve your self-understanding and awareness.
- The Relationship Review (15 Minutes): Examine different aspects of your relationship with a partner, close friend, or family member using an open, non-judgmental approach
- Managing Arguments In A Relationship (20 Minutes): Learn how to navigate arguments effectively and kindly using a situation of your choosing.
Having social interactions and spending time with a variety of kind people is an essential part of our general well-being, but this can become counterproductive when your interactions are with people who are untrustworthy or who aim to harm you.
We hope this “wisdom of the crowds” summary helps you to identify some of the warning signs of unsafe people!
This first appeared on Clearer Thinking on November 3, 2023, and first appeared on this site on November 8, 2023.
First, what’s the point of sharing what *other* people say are red flags? Are those actually good guidelines or are people poor judges of character?
I feel this is a particularly unhelpful list of traits as not only are these the traits that pretty much everyone assumes are relevant (so no new information) these are all traits that *every* person or relationship will have to some degree or another and are described in a way that could fit virtually any relationship or interaction.
Re: Manipulation: Is it enough that they tried to dress up when they saw you early in the relationship and be on their best behavior? That’s literally such a universal human behavior we have entire comedy routines about people avoiding bodily functions or being extra courteous around a new partner.
Re: Dishonesty: If you meet someone on an online dating site and they admit that they listed hiking as a hobby but only really does it a few times a year when a friend invites them. Does that qualify? What about someone who exaggerated their height?
And every last quality has this feature. What kind of information does that provide?
I fear, the kind of person who is overly concerned about bad individuals will use this as an excuse to avoid giving someone a chance while the kind of person who is inclined to ignore red flags can wave them away for the same reason.
I agree with you that the amount of these is very important. Obviously someone telling a white lie every once in a while is not nearly as risky as someone who lies constantly about important things. There is not going to be some bright line cutoff between these. But these are signs that someone is harmful, and the more of these they do, the more I would personally predict they are likely to be harmful (for most of these traits – though I didn’t write this list, it was crowdsourced).