Competing for attention: The effects of jealousy on preference for attention-grabbing products

Abstract

Jealous individuals often harbor feelings of aggression toward both their relationship partner and their rivals. However, jealousy can also have quite different effects that have implications for people's product preferences. Five experiments converge on the conclusion that jealousy induces a desire to recapture attention from one's partner and that this desire generalizes to unrelated situations in which the partner is not involved. Thus, jealousy increases people's preferences for attention-grabbing products and this is true even when the public display of the products could bring negative attention. The effect of jealousy only occurs when the products are consumed in public. Finally, the influence of jealousy on product evaluations is distinguished from that of other negative emotions such as envy and feelings of powerlessness.