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Contents
- Abstract
- Defining Envy
- Envy Proper and Benign Envy
- Envy and Longing
- Envy and Jealousy
- Semantic confusion
- The co-occurrence of envy and jealousy
- Jealousy and its greater intensity
- Envy and Resentment
- Summary of Definitional Issues
- Important Questions Concerning Envy
- Why Do We Envy?
- Whom Do We Envy?
- Similarity
- Self-relevance of the comparison domain
- The Question of Perceived Control
- Similarity and its complex role in perception of control
- Relative deprivation and perceived control
- The Hostile Nature of Envy
- The perception of hostility in other people's envy
- Hostility and narrowing relative differences at own expense
- Envious hostility in the workplace or in group settings
- Envy and schadenfreude
- Why is Envy a Hostile Emotion?
- Adaptive reaction to low ranking
- Frustration, injustice, and hostility
- Envy and shame
- Private Awareness and Public Acknowledgement of Envy
- Competitive axis of envy
- Fear axis of envy
- Implications for measuring envy: Direct and indirect measures of dispositional envy
- Research on envy and schadenfreude
- Possible insights using a psychoanalytic perspective
- The Transmutational Nature of Envy
- Applications and Future Directions
- Envious Prejudice and Intergroup Relations
- Envy and Mental and Physical Health
- Envy and mental health
- Envy and physical health
- Coping with Envy
- Types of strategies for coping with envy
- Challenges associated with studying coping strategies
- Summary and Conclusions
Abstract
The authors reviewed the psychological research on envy. The authors examined definitional challenges associated with studying envy, such as the important distinction between envy proper (which contains hostile feelings) and benign envy (which is free of hostile feelings). The authors concluded that envy is reasonably defined as an unpleasant, often painful emotion characterized by feelings of inferiority, hostility, and resentment caused by an awareness of a desired attribute enjoyed by another person or group of persons. The authors examined questions such as why people envy, why envy contains hostile feelings, and why it has a tendency to transmute itself. Finally, the authors considered the role of envy in helping understand other research domains and discussed ways in which people cope with the emotion.
Envy, the unpleasant emotion that can arise when we compare unfavorably with others, is a common experience for most people regardless of culture (e.g., Foster, 1972; Schoeck, 1969; Teitelbaum, 1976; Walcot, 1978). One reason that envy is important...