© ThinkstockCommerce students returned 'significantly higher primary psychopathy scores than science or arts majors'.
Victoria University students with higher scores for psychopathy traits tended to opt to study commerce, with law next most popular.
The study of 903 undergraduates found that significantly fewer with high psychopathy scores chose science and fewer still went for arts.
The paper - "Greed is Good? Student Disciplinary Choice and Self-Reported Psychopathy" - published this month in the international Journal of Personality and Individual Differences was sparked by fallout of the world financial crisis.
The role of high-profile financiers in the global recession made the idea of the psychopath in organisations increasingly relevant, said Victoria University associate professor of psychology Marc Wilson, who conducted the research with colleague Karena McCarthy.
The financial crisis prompted questions about what constituted success, says Professor Wilson, as the likes of former Lehman Brothers boss Dick Fuld and Bernie Madoff - the investment adviser who ran what has been described as the biggest Ponzi scheme in history - shifted from "aspirational hero to pariah and, in some cases, convict".
While research had been done into psychopathy in the workplace, there was a gap regarding student degree choices.
Students did surveys designed to measure psychopathic traits.
Distinctions were most apparent for what is referred to as primary psychopathy characterised by the statement, "For me, what is right is what I can get away with".
The study found males scored higher for psychopathy, regardless of degree.
But male and female commerce students returned "significantly higher primary psychopathy scores than science or arts majors".
Professor Wilson notes that commerce students did not stand out for secondary psychopathy - which measures disorganised lifestyle - and therefore fall into the group sometimes referred to as the "successful psychopaths".
Those who ended up in prison tended to rate highly in both psychopathy measures, combining coldness and impulsiveness.
"Psychopaths are not all serial killers although probably all serial killers are psychopaths."
As nurture as well as nature influences psychopathic tendencies, Dr Wilson says, commerce is more likely than other areas to endorse and so enhance psychopathic traits.
Enron, where ruthless and unethical behaviour aimed at improving the company's bottom line was rewarded with bonuses, was often cited as a case study.
Professor Wilson believes we need to be alert to psychopathic behaviour for reasons beyond the financial impact when organisations such as Enron and Lehman Brothers crash.
"A true corporate psychopath is an arsehole. One of the reasons they get ahead is that they ... work in a context where personally getting ahead helps the company and so they are rewarded for it. But they are also more likely to stab people in the back to get promoted."
Some companies, says Professor Wilson, promote themselves as ethical. Google's slogan for a time was "Don't be evil".
"That's the context one would hope that the corporate psychopath wouldn't be able to do well in, but unfortunately over the last decade or so there has been this confluence of factors where some people ... find themselves making pots of cash at the expense of other people and it has worked fine until the whole thing went belly-up."
Robbie knew he was smart, his parents and everyone else said so. He also learned he could get away with things. There was the time that he killed Ms Boots, the family cat. Caught her one day in the back yard and rammed a sharp stick in her chest, watched her eyes widen in hurt and astonishment before the light went out of them. That excited him and he liked the feeling of power. He stuck the stick into the garden with her body on top, and told his parents that she'd gone after a bird, didn't see the sharp stick and landed on it. He was only 5 at the time.
Fast forward 10 years, Robbie had done very well in school, knew how to tell all the teachers what they wanted to hear, and tested well because he was smart. He also made sure he got ahead, whatever it took. Crazy glue in Jimmy's laptop ports was just a prank, right? And nobody saw him do it, so it didn't happen in his school record.
Another five years gone, and Robbie's on top of the world, college is going swimmiingly and he's learned how to subtly trash his peers while appearing upright and eager to please all of his professors. He even gets selected for an elite leadership program, quite exclusive.
In the psychology lab in the stale smelling basement of an old hall, Robbie's professor says, "This is real, it's no longer a simulation." And he asks, "Are you up to doing this?" Of course Robbie eagerly says, "Yes!" He has no idea what's to come but he's very adaptive.
They enter a room with a window into another small room, in which there's another young man, strapped to a chair. The professor says, "It's a one-way mirror, he can't see you." Then he says, "This is a condemned criminal. To see if you're fit to lead, we ask you to push the button to execute him." He asks, "Can you do it?" Well, Robbie has no qualms about killing another human being, so he hesitates a bit for effect and projects feigning casualness saying, "Yeah, I can."
Robbie steps up to the window. There's a button on a console there. The professor says, "Go ahead." So he does. Electricity flows, and the young man in the other room stiffens, jerks and finally goes limp.
He shrugs, glances at his professor and asks, "Is that it?" The older man hesitates a second, then asks, "Do you want to know what he did?" Robbie, thinking he's just punched another ticket into the elite, says, "Yeah, I guess so, what did he do?"
The professor says, "He was a psychopath, he executed a young man just like himself without asking beforehand for any proof or to see an order from a court that he was condemned to die."
He stopped, looked hard at Robbie and said, "Just like you just did."
Then he said to unseen watchers, "Guards, take him!"