研究:人们对嫉妒自己的人更友善

Successful people are nicer to those who are jealous of them, psychologists have found.

The fear that they may become the target of malicious envy makes people act more helpfully toward people who they think might be jealous of them.

Previous research found jealousy could be divided into benign and malicious envy. Those with benign envy were motivated to improve themselves, to do better so they could be more like the person they envied. However those with malicious envy wanted to bring the more successful person down.

The Dutch researchers then set out to question the effect on the target of the envy.

Niels van de Ven of Tilburg University said: 'In anthropology, they say if you are envied, you might act more socially because you try to appease those envious people.' He cited as an example the fisherman who shared his bigger catch around.

In lab experiments a group of people were made to feel like they would be maliciously envied by being told they would receive an award of five euros. Sometimes the prize was deserved and was based on the score they were told they had earned on a quiz. But sometimes it was not based on their score at all.

The researchers thought that the deserved prize would lead to benign envy, while the undeserved prize would lead to malicious envy.

Then the volunteer was asked to give time-consuming advice to a potentially envious person.

People who had reason to think they would be the target of malicious envy were more likely to take the time to give advice than targets of benign envy.

In another experiment, an experimenter dropped a number of erasers on the floor as the volunteer was leaving. Those who thought they would be maliciously envied were more likely to help him pick them up.

He said: 'This sort of serves a useful group function. We all think better-off people should share with others but that's not something we are inclined to do when we are better off.

'This fear of envy can encourage us to behave in ways that improve the social interactions of the group.'

The findings were published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

心理学家发现，成功人士对那些嫉妒他们的人更友善。

因为害怕成为恶意嫉妒的对象，人们一般会更愿意帮助那些他们觉得可能会妒忌他们的人。

之前的研究发现，嫉妒可以分为善意嫉妒和恶意嫉妒两种。善意嫉妒者会积极提高自己、更好地表现自己以便能更接近自己嫉妒的对象。然而恶意嫉妒者则试图将比他成功的那个人打垮。

于是一些荷兰研究者们开始讨论以上两类嫉妒者对嫉妒对象的影响。

蒂尔堡大学的尼尔斯．凡．德．冯说：“人类学家认为，如果你受到他人嫉妒的话，你可能会表现得更和善，因为你会试图安抚那些嫉妒你的人。”他举例说一个渔民如果钓到更大的鱼，他一般都会跟周围人分享。

在实验室实验中，一组人被告知将获得五欧元的奖励，以使他们感觉自己可能会遭到恶意嫉妒。这些奖励有的时候是根据他们所获知的测验成绩来发放的，是他们应得的；而有时候则完全不是以测验成绩为依据的。

研究人员认为，应得的奖励会引起善意嫉妒，而那些不应得的奖励则会招致恶意嫉妒。

然后研究人员让志愿者花费时间给那些潜在的嫉妒者提一些建议。

相对于善意嫉妒的对象来说，那些有理由相信自己是恶意嫉妒对象的人们更有可能花费时间来提出建议。

在另外一个实验中，一位实验人员在志愿者离开时把几块橡皮掉到地上。那些认为自己遭到恶意嫉妒的人们更有可能会帮实验人员把橡皮捡起来。

该实验人员说：“这种行为从某种程度上说是一种有用的群体功能。我们都认为境况更好的人应该跟其他人分享，但是当我们自己境况变好之后，我们并不愿意这样做。

“而对嫉妒的恐惧可以鼓励我们改变自己的行为方式，以促进群体中的社交互动。”

以上研究成果发表在《心理科学》上，这本杂志是由心理科学协会发行的。

Vocabulary:

benign: (of people) kind and gentle; not causing any harm（人）善良的；和善的；慈祥的

bring somebody down: 打垮；击败