Men are more jealous of sexual infidelity than women, and women are more jealous of emotional infidelity than men.
This is according to a study – “Factors that Influence People’s Beliefs About Men’s and Women’s Jealousy Responses” by Mons Bendixen and Leif Edward Ottesen Kennair – that appeared in Evolutionary Psychological Science.
The researchers analyzed responses from 1,213 people where the majority were heterosexual (86.2%). They also conducted analyses on sexual minorities (bisexuals and homosexuals).
The researchers found that:
- In heterosexual relationships, men are more often worried about whether their partner is having sex with other people. Women are more often most worried about their partner falling in love with someone else.
- “We understand our own sex best,” said Kennair, meaning that – generally speaking – “men are good at understanding other men’s jealousy responses, and women are good at understanding other women’s jealousy responses. At the same time, we are surprisingly good at understanding the opposite sex at the group level.”
- Both sexes largely believe that their own gender becomes jealous for the same reasons as themselves, but they use themselves to a much lesser extent as a guide for what they think makes people of the opposite sex jealous.
- There was no major difference between how heterosexuals and sexual minorities interpret jealousy in others, meaning that sexual preference doesn’t really play a role.
- “Homosexual, bisexual and heterosexual men reported that other men would be more jealous of sexual infidelity than they would admit,” says Bendixen, stressing that they have a somewhat stereotypical perception of what makes men jealous.
The researchers also asked the participants how much they knew about typical reactions to jealousy and what could be signs of infidelity from various sources such as friends, family, teaching, the media and their own experiences of infidelity.
The numbers are very clear, the researchers stated. “Social influence has no impact on what we think about other people’s jealousy responses. Popular culture typically describes infidelity as sexual infidelity, but this does not seem to affect what most people get upset about, namely emotional infidelity,” says Kennair.
But if friends, family, and the media don’t affect us at all, where do our perceptions of jealousy come from?
“We believe that this is largely evolved, something innate that is programmed,” says Bendixen. Meaning: “It has simply been an advantage for our ancestors to be able to interpret jealousy. Jealousy and infidelity are among the most common reasons why couples break up.”
For Kennair, therefore: “It is therefore useful to know something about jealousy. In our study on forgiveness of infidelity, men were perhaps a little naïve about both their partners’ and their own emotional infidelity, as this is something that can threaten a relationship.”
