The different consequences of benign versus malicious envy

Abstract

This thesis draws on and informs the current understanding of the distinction between benign and malicious envy, predicting that benign envy, as compared to malicious envy, heightens people’s private self-awareness, which in turn affects subsequent behavior in a variety of unrelated contexts. Specifically, our conceptualization posits that benign envy should lead to improved self-control, higher correspondence between sequential choices and greater responsiveness to affective feelings when making choice relative to malicious envy. Results from five experiments provide some support for these predictions, contributing to the literature on different types of envy and also that on self-awareness.

Date of Award	2015
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology