Wikipedia says, Jealousy is an emotion and typically refers to the negative thoughts and feelings of insecurity, fear, and anxiety over an anticipated loss of something that the person values, such as a relationship, friendship, or love. Jealousy often consists of a combination of emotions such as anger, sadness, and disgust. Jealousy differs from envy in that jealousy is about something one has and is afraid of losing, while envy refers to something one does not have and either wants to acquire or to prevent another from acquiring.
“Jealousy is defined as a protective reaction to a perceived threat to a valued relationship, arising from a situation in which the partner’s involvement with an activity and/or another person is contrary to the jealous person’s definition of their relationship.” (Bevan, 2004, page 195)
In psychology
Jealousy involves an entire “emotional episode,” including a complex “narrative,”: the circumstances that lead up to jealousy, jealousy itself as emotion, any attempt at self regulation, subsequent actions and events and the resolution of the episode (Parrott, 2001, p. 306). The narrative can originate from experienced facts, thoughts, perceptions, memories, but also imagination, guess and assumptions. The more society and culture matter in the formation of these factors, the more jealousy can have a social and cultural origin. By contrast, Goldie (2000, p. 228) shows how jealousy can be a “cognitively impenetrable state”, where education and rational belief matter very little. One possible explanation of the origin of jealousy in evolutionary psychology is that the emotion evolved in order to maximize the success of our genes: it is a biologically based emotion (Prinz after Buss and Larsen, 2004, p. 120) selected to foster the certainty about the paternity of one’s own offspring. A jealous behavior, in men, is directed into avoiding sexual betrayal and a consequent waste of resources and effort in taking care of someone else’s offspring. There are, additionally, cultural or social explanations of the origin of jealousy. According to one, the narrative from which jealousy arises can be in great part made by the imagination. Imagination is strongly affected by the culture a person is inserted in. The pattern of reasoning, the way one perceives situations, depends strongly on cultural context. While mainstream psychology considers sexual arousal through jealousy a paraphilia, some authors on sexuality (Serge Kreutz, Instrumental Jealousy) have argued that jealousy in manageable dimensions can have a definite positive effect on sexual function and sexual satisfaction. Studies have also shown that jealousy sometimes heightens passion towards partners and increases the intensity of passionate sex. [28] [29]Jealousy in children and teenagers has been observed more often in those with low self-esteem and can evoke aggressive reactions. One such study suggested that developing intimate friends can be followed by emotional insecurity and loneliness in some children when those intimate friends interact with others. Jealousy linked to aggression and low self-esteem.
I have been thinking since long that-
Does everyone feel jealous about something or someone?
I do experience this weird feeling many a times, and since my childhood I am not been able to recognize its cause and how we can overcome it. Experts say little bit of jealousy is fine but too much of it can be like a deadly infectious disease which can not be cured by any means. As we know jealousy is a negative emotion then I don’t see any reason to believe that it is normal to have little bit of it but still most of us, I think all of us to experience this feeling at some or the other time throughout our life. To conclude, I can say it’s like friction which is necessary evil.
