London - Clever and high-achieving people are more jealous than their under-achieving peers, according to new research, and this is especially the case with women.
A study from Roanoke College in Virginia found that the higher a student’s grades, the more prone they were to feelings of romantic “Facebook jealousy” – jealous feelings caused by Facebook posts made by, or sent to, their sexual partner.
The researchers concluded that this was because high achievers are perfectionists and when they think their partner is cheating on them, this desire for perfection is disrupted.
Participants in the study were asked to imagine different hypothetical Facebook scenarios.
These included seeing ambiguous messages on their partner’s Facebook page from a person of the opposite sex, such as “What are you up to later?”
They were then asked how seeing those messages would make them feel.
The researchers additionally tested whether jealousy levels increased when emoticons were used after the messages.
These included smiley and winking faces.
According to the results, women suffered from much higher levels of “Facebook jealousy” than men.
Adding a winking emoticon was found to have no effect on women’s jealousy levels, while men became more jealous when an emoticon was used compared with when no emoticon was present.
The researchers then compared the results with each participant’s individual grade point average (GPA) score.
Those who showed higher levels of jealousy were also found to have higher GPAs.
Study researcher Denise Friedman, an associate professor of psychology at Roanoke College in Salem, told Live Science: “Students with higher GPAs are often more conscientious, show greater self-control and tend to be perfectionistic.
“Perceived infidelity probably upsets their attempts at perfection across the board.
“Evolutionary work suggests men are more jealous of sexual infidelity, while women are more jealous of emotional infidelity,” she said.
“The winking emoticon was most likely perceived as flirtatious, perhaps even sexually suggestive, which may explain why men were more jealous if emoticons were present.”
The full findings will be published later in the year. – Daily Mail
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