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Jealousy
- involves self, loved one and rival
- threat to or loss of important relationship
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Jealousy could be
- a basic emotion
- or a compound emotion
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Jealousy as a compound emotion
- it is a combination of basic emotions (fear, sadness, and anger)
- or that it is a label for a situation
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Social-cognitive perspective
- 2 forms of jealous:
- primitive form
- elaborated form
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primitive form
- urge to stop the interaction between the loved one and the rival
- this may occur in infants and other animals
- to maintain and reestablish relationships
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elaborated form
- with age meaning of interaction becomes important
- threat to self-concept or self-esteem (if loved one starts spending time with someone else, why? am i boring?)
- to relationship rewards (we get love, attention, rewards, the things you enjoy in the relationship)
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Hart (1998) experiment
- Subject: 6 month olds (no siblings)
- IV: Mom plays with dolls vs. nonsocial toy
- DV: facial expressions and behavior (do they try to get mother attention, temper tantrums?)
- Can jealousy be seen at such an early age?
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Results to Hart (1998) experiment
- Babies had greater negative affect when the mother paid attention to the doll than the toy
- jealousy can be seen as early as 6 months
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A study of jealousy over time
Masciuch and Kienapple
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Masciuch and Kienapple exp.
- subjects: 4.5 months - 7 yr old
- IV: mom interacts with infants vs. same age peer
- DV: behaviors
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Results of Masciuch and Kienapple exp.
- around 6-8.5 months start seeing some jealousy reactions
- 1.5 years old no doubt there is jealousy
- correct the other child, pretend call father to tell on their mother
- children 3.5+: jealous to peer > to baby
- younger children = no effect of rivals age
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What is key aspect of Masciuch and Kienapple exp.?
- By 3.5 year old they were no longer jealous of the infant, they were jealous of the peer
- younger children do not care if it is an infant or a peer, just equally as jealous
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Jealousy over infidelity
- adult jealousy
- it is a motive for murder
- 12-16% or as high as 25% of murder across cultures
- frequent cause for divorce
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Evolutionary Psychology perceptive
- Jealousy as a specific innate module theory (JSIM)
- Buss et. al Study
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Evolutionary Psychologists believe
- that the way the brain is hardwired is for it perform certain functions/mechanisms
- men prefer .7 hip to waist ratio
- there are lots of routes the mind could have taken
- Evolutionary Psychology does NOT equal natural selection
- what triggers jealousy in men id different for women
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Jealousy as a specific innate module theory (JSIM)
- Men get jealous over sexual infidelity
- Women get jealous over emotion infidelity
- why? because they face different adaptive challenges
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Jealousy as a specific innate module theory (JSIM) for men
- men expend their resources on their offspring and will expend their resources if the offspring is their own
- mens problem is cuckoldry causing them to develop sexual jealousy module
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Jealousy as a specific innate module theory (JSIM) for women
- the problem is not wanting your mate giving his resources to some other female
- the solution is that females are emotionally prone (emotional jealousy module)
- men that are in love will their resources to the female they love
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what is the evidence of the jealousy difference between men and women?
Buss et al study
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Buss et al study
Forced-choice (FC) hypothetical scenario - what would upset you more?
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Buss et al study results
- 25% of women choose sexual infidelity
- 50% of men choose sexual infidelity
- therefore women think emotionally attached is worst
- Just because there are sexual difference doesnt mean it is innate
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Contrast Between Theories (JSIM and Social Cognition)
- Type of threat and role of cognitive appraisals:
- JSIM: cognition confined to detection of infidelity
- Social-Cognition: cognition/appraisal important (am i boring? did we agree not do this?), many possible threats
- emotional process specific to infidelity?:
- JSM: yes, mechanisms specific to mating
- Social Cognition: no, same jealous process across interpersonal contexts (the same jealousy you would feel with friends and family)
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Adult Study of Real Infidelity
- Harris (2002)
- Subjects: 196 adults
- Measure: (1)FC infidelity questions and (2)reactions to mate's actually infidelity (degree focus on sexual vs emotional aspects)
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Results Harris (2002)
- actual infidelity: people focused more on the emotional betrayal that the sexual betrayal
- men and women are similar than different
- dont get a difference in men and women killing each other over jealousy
- Buss does not hold up
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Why might the 2 sexes have similar jealous reactions?
- Ancestral environment may have been different: more sharing in the past... men did not provide specifically to the gathering
- Different proximate mechanisms: more jealousy mechanism may solve both cuckoldry and resources loss, spot the flirty clues to stop infidelity
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