The bidirectional relationship between benign/malicious envy and subjective well-being in adolescents: The mediating effect of self-esteem.

INTRODUCTION: Subjective well-being, an important index for measuring mental health, is presently declining among junior high school students. Envy, one of their common emotions, is inextricably linked to subjective well-being. Based on the Dual Envy Theory, our research explores the bidirectional relationship between benign-malicious envy and subjective well-being. The mediating role of self-esteem, as well as the related gender differences, is examined. METHODS: Chinese middle school students (n = 1566, boys 50.3%, age = 13.96 ± 0.88 years old) were assessed at two time points over a 3-month interval. Structural equation modeling was used to examine the longitudinal relationships among the variables. RESULTS: (1) Cross-lagged analysis showed a positive bidirectional relationship between benign envy and subjective well-being and a negative bidirectional relationship between malicious envy and subjective well-being in the total sample. However, the path from T1 subjective well-being to T2 malicious envy in boys was not significant. (2) Self-esteem mediated the relationship between both benign and malicious envy and subjective well-being among both boys and girls. A Wald chi-square test showed that T2 self-esteem was a stronger predictor of T2 benign envy in boys than in girls. CONCLUSION: The results reveal a virtuous cycle of benign envy and subjective well-being, and a vicious cycle of malicious envy and subjective well-being, while emphasizing the role of self-esteem in this process. Gender differences were also noted. These findings have important implications for improving the subjective well-being of secondary school students and exploring the positive effects of envy.

Lower class competence stereotypes of the upper class increase class conflict: mediation by intergroup envy and moderation by upward social mobility belief.

Background: With increasing gaps between the rich and poor, potential risk factors for class conflict have attracted increasing attention from researchers. Although cognitive factors are known to be significant predictors of class-conflict behavior, limited attention has been paid to competence stereotypes of the upper class. When considering economic inequality, people pay more attention to competence stereotypes of the upper class, which may have adverse effects. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between competence stereotypes held by the lower class about the upper class and class conflict, and to test the mediating role of intergroup envy in this relationship and the moderating role of upward social mobility belief. Methods: Data were collected from a convenience sample from a comprehensive university in China. Based on scores on subjective and objective class scales, 284 lower-class college students (103 males and 181 females) aged 18-24 were selected to participate (both their subjective and objective scores were lower than 3 points). Their endorsement of upper-class competence stereotypes, intergroup envy, upward social mobility beliefs, and class conflict were measured using a well-validated self-report questionnaire. Results: The main data were analyzed using correlation analysis, the SPSS macro PROCESS (Model 7), and simple slope analysis. The results show a significant positive correlation between competence stereotypes held by lower-class college students toward the higher class and class conflict, and this connection was mediated by intergroup envy. Moreover, the indirect effect of intergroup envy on this link was moderated by upward social mobility beliefs; this effect was stronger for college students with lower upward social mobility beliefs. Conclusion: This study broadens our understanding of how and when competence stereotypes among the lower class concerning the upper class are related to class conflict. Researchers and policymakers should pay special attention to competence stereotypes of the upper class, especially intergroup envy and class conflict among lower-class individuals with lower levels of upward social mobility beliefs.

Neural mechanisms of different types of envy: a meta-analysis of activation likelihood estimation methods for brain imaging.

Previous studies have a lack of meta-analytic studies comparing the trait (personality) envy, social comparison envy, and love-envy, and the understanding of the similarities and differences in the neural mechanisms behind them is relatively unclear. A meta-analysis of activation likelihood estimates was conducted using 13 functional magnetic resonance imaging studies. Studies first used single meta-analyses to identify brain activation areas for the three envy types. Further, joint and comparative analyses were followed to assess the common and unique neural activities among the three envy types. A single meta-analysis showed that the critical brain regions activated by trait (personality) envy included the inferior frontal gyrus, cingulate gyrus, middle frontal gyrus, lentiform nucleus and so on. The critical brain regions activated by social comparison envy included the middle frontal gyrus, inferior frontal gyrus, medial frontal gyrus, precuneus and so on. The critical brain regions activated by love-envy included the inferior frontal gyrus, superior frontal gyrus, cingulate gyrus, insula and so on. In terms of the mechanisms that generate the three types of envy, each of them is unique when it comes to the perception of stimuli in a context; in terms of the emotion regulation mechanisms of envy, the three types of envy share very similar neural mechanisms. Both their generation and regulation mechanisms are largely consistent with the cognitive control model of emotion regulation. The results of the joint analysis showed that the brain areas co-activated by trait (personality) envy and social comparison envy were frontal sub-Gyral, inferior parietal lobule, inferior frontal gyrus, precuneus and so on; the brain areas co-activated by trait (personality) envy and love-envy were extra-nuclear lobule, lentiform nucleus, paracentral lobule, cingulate gyrus and so on; the brain regions that are co-activated by social comparison envy and love-envy are anterior cingulate gyrus, insula, supramarginal gyrus, inferior frontal gyrus and so on. The results of the comparative analysis showed no activation clusters in the comparisons of the three types of envy.

Balancing the benefits of vaccination: An envy-free strategy.

The Covid-19 pandemic revealed the difficulties of vaccinating a population under the circumstances marked by urgency and limited availability of doses while balancing benefits associated with distinct guidelines satisfying specific ethical criteria. We offer a vaccination strategy that may be useful in this regard. It relies on the mathematical concept of envy-freeness. We consider finding balance by allocating the resource among individuals that seem heterogeneous concerning the direct and indirect benefits of vaccination, depending on age. The proposed strategy adapts a constructive approach in the literature based on Sperner's Lemma to point out an approximate division of doses guaranteeing that both benefits are optimized each time a batch becomes available. Applications using data about population age distributions from diverse countries suggest that, among other features, this strategy maintains the desired balance, throughout the entire vaccination period. We discuss complementary aspects of the method in the context of epidemiological models of age-stratified Susceptible - Infected - Recovered (SIR) type.

A longitudinal study on the effect of labor values on benign/malicious envy: the mindfulness reperceiving model.

This study investigates the relationship between labor values and two forms of envy-benign and malicious-as well as the potential mediating role of mindfulness using a mindfulness reperceiving model. Two thousand three hundred sixty three Chinese teenagers participated in a longitudinal study over an eight-month period, completing questionnaires measuring labor values, benign envy, malicious envy, and mindfulness. The cross-sectional data showed that labor values had an immediate negative effect on malicious envy, with mindfulness partially mediating this relationship. Additionally, labor values had an immediate positive effect on benign envy, but mindfulness did not mediate this relationship. Longitudinal data analysis revealed that the delayed effect of labor values on later benign/malicious envy was similar to its immediate effect. However, mindfulness only played a mediating role in the relationship between labor values and later malicious envy. Cross-gender stability was found in both the immediate effect model and the delayed effect model. Overall, this study sheds light on the influence of labor values on the development of social emotions and the potential mediating role of mindfulness in the Chinese cultural context.

From Envy to Radicalization.

Models of radicalization have typically placed grievances at the heart of radicalization. In contrast, we argue that viewing the radicalizing agent as decidedly proactive, and less reactive, better accounts for the available data. At the core of our radicalization model is the functional structure of envy. The operative properties of the emotion align with essential and conspicuous features of the radicalization process: a motivation to monitor social differentials, an identification of sources of postulated welfare costs, an impulse to eliminate or depower purported competitors, an attempt to diffuse responsibility for one's aggressive actions, and the rejoicing at the envied agent's misfortune. Two of those operative properties are particularly important for our understanding of radicalization. Envy motivates the neutralization of competitors when responsibility for welfare costs is not objectively attributable to others' wrongdoing toward the party who feels injured. The "process of typification" serves as a means to diffuse responsibility. It extends the reach of individual concerns by downplaying the particulars of the personal situation motivating the envious agent while evoking universally shared interaction templates (e.g., humiliation, injustice) to appeal to a broader audience.

How social media sharing drives consumption intention: the role of social media envy and social comparison orientation.

BACKGROUND: Social media benign envy, an upward comparison-based and painful emotions associated with the motivation to improve oneself, has attracted increasing attention from researchers due to its ubiquitous and significant impact on social network users' intentions and behavior. However, the results of previous studies on whether material or experiential consumption is more likely to cause social media envy (treated as a single construct) have been inconsistent, and there is a lack of research on what triggers social media users to experience more intense benign envy and thus inspiring their consumption intentions. The purpose of this study is to investigate how the type and luxuriousness of shared consumption and viewer's social comparison orientation jointly affect social media users' consumption intentions through benign envy. METHODS: A 2 (type of consumption sharing: experiential vs. material) × 2 (luxuriousness of consumption sharing: luxury vs. non-luxury) × 2 (social comparison orientation: high vs. low) mixed-design experiment was conducted to test theoretical model with data from 544 undergraduates in China. SPSS 26.0 and the Process macro were used to test the model. RESULTS: The results revealed that luxury experiential consumption information shared on social media triggered more benign envy compared with other types of shared consumption information. When social media users shared non-luxury consumption, experiential consumption was more likely to inspire benign envy among users with high social comparison orientation than material consumption. However, when luxury consumption was shared, benign envy acted as a mediator between purchase type and participants' purchase intention regardless of whether participants' social comparison orientation was high or low. CONCLUSION: This study revealed that whether and how social comparison orientation of social media users who read the shared content influences the mechanism by which the type of consumption sharing on social media affects social media users' consumption intentions through benign envy as a mediator is dependent on the luxuriousness of the shared consumption. The findings not only provide new insights for researchers to better understand social media envy and the underlying psychological mechanism for social media readers' consumption intention, but also have practical implications for practitioners.

The effect of wrongdoer's status on observer punishment recommendations: the mediating role of envy and the moderating role of belief in a just world.

Our proposition postulates that the correlation between the wrongdoer's status and the punishment suggestions of onlookers is primarily influenced by group-oriented envy rather than the ascription of intentionality and is moderated by the belief in a just world. In three separate studies, 389 university students were asked to read scenarios describing a hit-and-run crime committed by either a rich or a poor individual and then report their opinions on intentionality attribution (Study 1 and Study 2), envy emotions (Study 2), punishment recommendations (all three studies), and belief in a just world (Study 3). Consistently, the findings indicated that those observing recommended harsher penalties to be imposed upon high-status perpetrators engaging in the same wrongdoing (such as hit-and-run) as their low-status equivalents. The effect of the rich receiving more severe punishment was predicted more strongly by envious emotions than by intentionality attributions to high-status wrongdoers and was only present for those observers who endorsed a lower belief in a just world.

How does proactive personality affect employee creativity and ostracism? The mediating role of envy.

When working alongside proactive colleagues, do you elevate yourself through benign envy or resort to malicious envy? To address this intriguing question, we constructed a model based on social comparison theory to measure the double-edged sword effects of proactive personality on employee outcomes. We hypothesized that proactive employees would induce two distinct tendencies in their peers-workplace ostracism and employee creativity-due to peer envy. The study analyzed 389 valid responses from full-time employees in Chinese organizations using structural equation modeling. Results indicate that proactive personality positively influences benign envy among peers, which in turn positively affects employee creativity. Moreover, benign envy mediates the relationship between proactive personality and employee creativity. On the other hand, proactive personality positively influences malicious envy among peers, which in turn positively affects workplace ostracism. Additionally, malicious envy mediates the relationship between proactive personality and workplace ostracism. This study intertwines personality, emotions, and workplace outcomes, thereby advancing the existing literature on social comparison theory. Additionally, it furnishes valuable insights for organizational human resource management, particularly in the realms of employee recruitment and workplace relationship management.

The relationship between self-efficacy, malicious or benign envy in nurses: A cross-sectional study.

AIM: To determine whether nurses' self-efficacy affected envy levels and to develop the necessary strategies. BACKGROUND: Envy is a widespread global phenomenon. Envy can harm the individual, the work environment, and nursing care. However, the relationships between self-efficacy and envy have not been adequately explored in the nursing context. METHODS: This study was conducted as a cross-sectional descriptive study. The study sample consisted of 361 nurses working in a university hospital in a province of Türkiye. The research model was analyzed using structural equation modeling. The participants were selected using convenience sampling. This study was reported using the STROBE checklist for cross-sectional studies. RESULTS: Nurses' educational status affected their self-efficacy. No other personal characteristics influenced self-efficacy and envy. There was a positive relationship between malicious and benign envy. As nurses' self-efficacy increased, malicious envy decreased and benign envy increased. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study showed that nurses' education level affected self-efficacy, and self-efficacy level affected envy, and malicious envy could be reduced by improving nurses' self-efficacy. IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING AND HEALTH POLICY: Nursing managers and policymakers should support nursing education at the minimum undergraduate level, encourage nurses to continue their professional education to improve their self-efficacy, and provide training to increase their self-efficacy.

How does benign/malicious envy impact young women's subjective well-being in daily life? An investigation of intrapersonal and interpersonal pathway.

Although previous cross-sectional studies have investigated the between-person correlation between dispositional envy and subjective well-being, few longitudinal studies have explored the within-person relationships between state benign/malicious envy and subjective well-being, as well as the intrapersonal and interpersonal mechanisms involved. This study adopted a diary approach for 14 consecutive days from a sample of 167 young women to investigate the within-person associations among benign/malicious envy, self-esteem, perceived social support, and subjective well-being. The results revealed that benign and malicious envy had opposite effects on subjective well-being within individuals. Besides, the results indicated that self-esteem and perceived social support mediated the relationships between benign envy and two dimensions of subjective well-being (positive affect and life satisfaction) within individuals. Furthermore, self-esteem played a within-person mediating role in the relationships between malicious envy and three dimensions of subjective well-being, whereas perceived social support only served as a within-person mediator between malicious envy and positive affect. These findings shed light on the distinction between benign envy and malicious envy and help in comprehending the intrapersonal and interpersonal mechanisms through which the two types of envy impact subjective well-being in daily life.

Are different countries equally green with envy? A comparison of the everyday concept of envy in the United States, Spain, and Germany.

Using a prototype approach to emotion concepts, we mapped the internal structure and content of the everyday concept of envy (as used in the United States) and its translation equivalents of envidia in Spanish and Neid in German. In Study 1 (total N = 415), the features of the concept of envy, envidia, and Neid were generated via an open-ended questionnaire. In Study 2 (total N = 404), participants rated the degree of typicality of the constitutive features on a forced-choice questionnaire. The prototype analysis of envy, supplemented with network analyses, revealed that the largest connected set of features of envy, envidia, and Neid shared a group of central features, including features related to success or to people with a better appearance. Still, envy, envidia, and Neid did differ with respect to their constituent peripheral features as well as the density of their networks, their structure, and the betweenness centrality of the nodes. These results suggest that a prototype approach combined with network analysis is a convenient approach for studying the internal structure of everyday emotion concepts and the degree of overlap with respect to the translation equivalents in different countries.

#Blessed: the moderating effect of dispositional gratitude on the relationship between social comparison and envy on Instagram.

Introduction: The role of dispositional gratitude as a positive psychological resource and prosocial personality trait in real life interactions militates in favor of its introduction to the research field of social media. Methods: Based on a literature review of the previously studied relationship of dispositional gratitude with social comparison and envy in offline settings, a twofold moderation model was proposed and quantitatively tested in a cross-sectional sample of N = 268 Instagram users aged between 18 and 40 years. Additionally, the dual conceptualization of benign and malicious envy was scrutinized by validating its respective connections with affective outcomes and inspiration on Instagram. Results and discussion: Dispositional gratitude serves as a protective factor when using Instagram by significantly mitigating the relationship of social comparison and malicious as well as general envy on Instagram. Furthermore, the results support the more nuanced understanding of envy as a dual construct in the face of social media use.

"Comparisons are Odious"? - Exploring the Dual Effect of Upward Social Comparison on Workplace Coping Behaviors of Temporary Agency Workers.

Temporary agency workers are becoming increasingly critical as a supplementary workforce within enterprises, inevitably leading upward social comparisons with permanent employees. However, existing research pays little attention to this phenomenon, which cannot provide theoretical guidance for the management of temporary agency workers. To fill this gap, our study utilizes the cognitive appraisal theory of emotion to construct a dual-path moderated mediation model, examining how upward social comparison is associated with positive and negative behaviors through two distinct forms of envy. Through the questionnaire survey, data is collected from 882 temporary agency workers in a Chinese temporary staffing firm. The results reveal that upward social comparison is associated with both benign and malicious envy, which in turn respectively relate to informal workplace learning and social undermining behavior. Additionally, psychological availability moderates the relationship between upward social comparison and envy, such that when psychological availability is higher (vs lower), the positive effect of upward social comparison on benign envy is stronger and the positive effect of upward social comparison on malicious envy is weaker. Moreover, psychological availability further moderates the indirect effect of upward social comparison on employee behavior. When psychological availability is higher (vs lower), the positive indirect effect of upward social comparison on informal workplace learning via benign envy is stronger, whereas the positive indirect effect of upward social comparison on social undermining via malicious envy is weaker. Our study enriches the theoretical research perspective of upward social comparison and provides insights for managing temporary agency workers. Our study is the first to explore the dual behavioral choices of upward social comparison of temporary agency workers and apply the cognitive appraisal theory of emotion to social comparison. The results indicate that organizations can improve the psychological availability of temporary agency workers to stimulate learning behavior and reduce social undermining behavior to achieve a win-win situation between temporary agency workers and organizations.

Naïve Theories of Emotions: Why People Might (Not) Be Uncertain or in Conflict About Felt Emotions.

Beliefs about conflict and uncertainty over felt emotions-for Joy, Pride, Sadness, Jealousy and Envy events-were studied by means of Yes/No and Why questions. Each participant (N = 1,156) judged a typical antecedent for a single emotion-e.g., Jealousy: story protagonist SP sees his or her partner kiss someone. The Yes/No results showed that SP was frequently expected to experience both phenomena, the more so the greater the event impact (Yes range: 40-86%). Beliefs associated with Yes answers (BY) were categorized into 4 categories: (BY1) reason-emotion opposition-felt emotions are unreasonable, inadequate ways of reacting; (BY2) ambivalent emotions-e.g., joy and sadness; (BY3) unclear emotions; (BY4) other causes-e.g., focused on event implications, SP's personality. No conflict or uncertainty answers (BN; range 14-60%) mirrored BY categories: (BN1) no reason-emotion opposition, (BN2) no ambivalent emotions, (BN3) clear emotions, (BN4) other causes. Attributions and beliefs about causes did not generally differ by gender. As a collective entity, expressed beliefs were complex, focusing on one or more emotion component-e.g., appraisal, regulation, expression-as well as on emotion intensity, duration, and on self-concept issues. Overall, expressed beliefs seemed to imply a malleability theory of emotions, and emotion awareness. Results overall confirmed the hypotheses that conflict and uncertainty attributions are more likely for: unpleasant experiences; when emotions are norm-incongruent for the judged event; when mixed, ambivalent emotions are felt. The study confirms that people interpret emotion processes according to their lay theories.

A Multi-objective Mathematical Programing Model for the Problem of P-envy Emergency Medical Service Location.

To prevent the great dangers caused by emergency situations, providing rapid and high-quality emergency aid highly depends on the location of emergency medical centers. The purpose of this research is to present a multi-objective mathematical programing model based on the minimum P-envy algorithm to locate and construct emergency medical services (EMS). Maximizing the coverage in order to increase the probability of survival of different categories of patients, minimizing the costs of constructing EMS and optimizing the ratio of regions having the right to emergency medical services is one of the fundamental challenges in the health care system of countries. In this paper, a model for maximum utilization of EMS considering budget limitations is presented. In this study, since the problem is NP-Hard, the Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Simulated Annealing (SA) algorithm were used to solve this problem. The parameters of the metaheuristic algorithms were tuned using the Taguchi method. Several instance problems were solved to compare the performance of 2 algorithms. The results demonstrate that the validity of the proposed model. Also, the mean of the solutions obtained by GA for small, medium, and large-size problems are better than the SA algorithm. Also, the GA algorithm obtained more efficient solutions than the SA algorithm.

The Influence of Workplace Envy on Employees' Knowledge-Hiding Behavior Based on a Comparative Analysis between Generation Cohorts.

How to promote the free flow of knowledge among employees is the core factor used to improve the innovation ability and even competitive advantage of an organization. Research on how to reduce knowledge-hiding behavior and promote knowledge sharing among employees becomes the key to enhancing the technological innovation capability of enterprises and effectively responding to the VUCA environment at present. Based on social comparison theory and regulatory focus theory, this study uses 402 enterprise employees as samples to deeply study the influence mechanism of workplace envy on their knowledge-hiding behavior and compare the differences between new-generation employees and non-new-generation employees. The research results show that: (1) employee's benign envy has a significant negative effect on knowledge-hiding behavior, while malicious envy has a significant positive effect on knowledge-hiding behavior. (2) Promotion regulatory focus plays a partly mediating effect between benign envy and employee knowledge-hiding behavior, while prevention regulatory focus also plays a partly mediating effect between malicious envy and employee knowledge-hiding behavior. (3) Generation not only has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between benign envy and promotion regulatory focus but also has a positive moderating effect on the relationship between malicious envy and prevention regulatory focus. This study further found that the younger the employee generation cohort, the more substantial the effect of benign envy on the promotion regulatory focus, while the older the employee generation cohort, the more substantial the effect of malicious envy on the prevention regulatory focus.

Workplace Ostracism Effects on Employees' Negative Health Outcomes: Focusing on the Mediating Role of Envy.

Employee health is crucial to organizational success. However, workplace ostracism (WO) has significant negative effects on employee health. Numerous researchers have extensively examined how WO influences employees' negative health (job stress, burnout); however, the focus on mediating effects in the relationship between WO and health has been lacking. This study examined the cognitive evaluation response to WO by employees who perceive they have been ostracized because another employee envies them. The psychological defense mechanism is expected to be activated-thus triggering job stress and burnout. We investigated envy perceived by individuals as a mediator of WO, job stress, and burnout using data from a 2-wave longitudinal survey of 403 employees of a South Korean firm. We found that employees perceived WO. Specifically, based on the sensitivity to being the target of a threatening upward comparison theory, it was confirmed that envy was a mediator in the relationship between WO and negative health outcomes. Our results are the first to show that the perception of envy can mediate the maintenance of a positive self-image in the context of WO in South Korea. The results suggest that a greater awareness of and focus on envy, and WO is required.

Do current concepts of One Health suffer from the physics envy.

The current models of One Health appear to be suffering from a elevated emphasis on a small area of interface involving humans, environment and animals. This may largely be because of an extension of our understanding of physical science to biological world, which, though is far more complexer.

Vaccine envy during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The term vaccine envy (i.e., envy experienced when others are given the opportunity to receive a COVID-19 vaccine) was coined during the COVID-19 pandemic and has received media attention. This study is the first to systematically investigate vaccine envy. In two pre-registered online surveys conducted in May 2021 (N = 1,174) and October/November 2021 (N = 535), we collected data from vaccinated and unvaccinated German participants, including measures of vaccine envy, well-being, personal experiences during the pandemic, and various trait constructs (e.g., justice sensitivity and self-esteem). We found that in May 2021, 47% of participants experienced vaccine envy at least sometimes and that vaccine envy was connected to victim sensitivity, subjective perceptions of being threatened by the pandemic, and an increased willingness to be vaccinated. By November 2021, however, vaccine envy among unvaccinated participants had almost disappeared. Our findings advance the understanding of the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.