Leveling Up and Down: The Experiences of Benign and Malicious Envy Niels van de Ven, Marcel Zeelenberg, and Rik Pieters Tilburg University Envy is the painful emotion caused by the good fortune of others. This research empirically supports the distinction between two qualitatively different types of envy, namely benign and malicious envy. It reveals that the experience of benign envy leads to a moving-up motivation aimed at improving one���s own position, whereas the experience of malicious envy leads to a pulling-down motivation aimed at damaging the position of the superior other. Study 1 used guided recall of the two envy types in a culture (the Netherlands) that has separate words for benign and malicious envy. Analyses of the experiential content of these emotions found the predicted differences. Study 2 and 3 used one sample from the United States and one from Spain, respectively, where a single word exists for both envy types. A latent class analysis based on the experiential content of envy confirmed the existence of separate experiences of benign and malicious envy in both these cultures as well. The authors discuss the implications of distinguishing the two envy types for theories of cooperation, group performance, and Schadenfreude. Keywords: envy, emotion, experiential content, cross cultural ���Envy is the great leveler: if it cannot level things up, it will level them down.��� Dorothy Sayers (1949, p. 771) People around us often do better than we do your brother may be better in tennis, your neighbor drives a newer model of your car, and a colleague receives the prestigious prize that you were after yourself. Such upward comparisons often lead to the emotional experience of envy. Aristotle (350BC/1954) already defined envy as the pain caused by the good fortune of others. A more recent definition is that ���envy arises when a person lacks another���s superior quality, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it��� (Parrott & Smith, 1993, p. 908). Envy is generally frowned upon (Schoeck, 1969), and is for example one of the seven deadly sins in the Catholic tradition. Despite the apparent darkness of envy, it is ���one of the most universal and deep-seated of human passions��� (Russell, 1930, p. 82), and the tendency to feel envy is pervasive and seems to be present in all cultures (Foster, 1972 Schoeck, 1969).1 Interestingly, Sayers��� (1949) opening quote suggests that envy might not be as homogeneous and may actually have two faces, one leveling up and the other leveling down. These two facets of envy, one being more positive and negative, have been speculated upon more often. On the more positive side, envy is seen as a motivational force that propels people to work harder to get what others already have (Foster, 1972 Frank, 1999). Envy might be one of the causes of phenomena such as keeping-up-with-the Joneses (the strong desire to have what one���s peers have) that spurs economic growth. An international advertising agency (Young & Rubicam, 2006) actively uses envy as a marketing tool in its campaigns, stating that products that evoke envy sell best. The negative side of envy is also often stressed. Envy is found to promote irrational decision-making (Beckman, Formby, Smith, & Zheng, 2002 Hoelzl & Loewenstein, 2005) and to hinder coop- eration (Parks, Rumble, & Posey, 2002) and group performance (Duffy & Shaw, 2000 Vecchio, 2005). Schoeck (1969) proposed that the fear of being envied prevents people from striving for excellence, thereby hindering the progress of societies as a whole. The leveling up and leveling down parts of envy are also present in Parrott and Smith���s (1993) previously mentioned definition that an envious person either desires the superior quality, achievement, or possession, or wishes that the other lacked it. Envy stems from an upward social comparison and can be reduced by narrowing the gap between oneself and the other. This can be achieved by moving oneself up to the level of the other, and by pulling the other down to one���s own position. We propose here that these two distinct envy experiences, one benign and the other 1 Envy is often equated with jealousy, but clear differences exist. Whereas envy arises when another person has something that one misses, jealousy arises when a person has something but is afraid of losing it to another person (Neu, 1980). Because it is common for people to use the emotion words envy and jealousy interchangeably in natural language, the few available empirical treatments of the experience of envy were aimed at distinguishing those two. Whereas at first the two experiences were thought to be similar (Salovey & Rodin, 1986, 1989), later research found clear differences in the experience of these emotions (Parrott & Smith, 1993 Smith, Kim, & Parrott, 1988). It is important to note that it was also found that the word jealousy was often used to indicate envy, but not the other way around. This implies that when asked about envy, people will not confuse this with jealousy. Niels van de Ven and Marcel Zeelenberg, Department of Social Psy- chology and TIBER (Tilburg Institute for Behavioral Economics Re- search), Tilburg University, Tilburg, the Netherlands Rik Pieters, Depart- ment of Marketing and TIBER, Tilburg University, Tilburg, the Netherlands. We thank Tom Gilovich, Sanne van Hooren, Marieke Rovers, Isabel Sa ��nchez, Marieke Schipper, Wijnand van Tilburg, and Jaione Yabar for their help in conducting the studies. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Niels van de Ven, Department of Social Psychology, Tilburg University, P.O. Box 90153, 5000LE Tilburg, the Netherlands. E-mail: n.v.d.ven@uvt.nl Emotion �� 2009 American Psychological Association 2009, Vol. 9, No. 3, 419���429 1528-3542/09/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0015669 419

malicious, elicit these different behavioral expressions. As ex- plained hereafter, it appears that it is not just the case that in some situations envy will lead to moving-up and in other situations to pulling-down, but rather that the emotional experiences of benign and malicious envy differ, from the activated thoughts to the elicited actions. The proposal of two different envy types has a longer history (e.g., Elster, 1991 Foster, 1972 Kant, 1780/1997 Neu, 1980 Parrott, 1991 Rawls, 1971 Smith, 1991 see for a review, Smith & Kim, 2007). However, ideas about two envy types have not been empirically tested, and these ideas differ in relevant aspects. Some theorists state that the distinction between types of envy is based upon the presence or absence of hostility, and that only envy with a component of hostility is envy proper (Rawls, 1971 Smith & Kim, 2007). According to them, envy without hostility resembles admiration and is therefore not a form of envy proper. Yet some- times benign envy is considered to be envy as well (Foster, 1972 Neu, 1980), because despite this lack of hostility, benign envy also still contains the pain or frustration caused by another���s superiority. The issue therefore remains whether or not there are distinct types of envy and what their experiential contents and behavioral implications are. The current research aims to clarify this issue and advance emotion theory by studying the experiential content of benign and malicious envy. In the first study, we chose to inves- tigate these types of envy in the context of two related but different emotions: admiration and resentment. Comparing benign and ma- licious envy to admiration and resentment is important because theory suggests that benign envy shares some resemblance with admiration, and malicious envy with resentment (e.g., Smith & Kim, 2007). We expected benign and malicious envy to differ from these related but different emotions, because envy typically arises after a frustrating upward comparison and this comparison is not necessary for either admiration or resentment. When studying the potential two-facedness of the emotion of envy, it is interesting to note that whereas some languages have a single word, others have multiple words to refer to envy. Lan- guages of the former kind are, among others, English (envy), Spanish (envidia), and Italian (invidia). Languages of the latter kind are, among others, Dutch (benijden and afgunst), Polish (zazdros�� ��c and zawis��) ��c and Thai (phonetically, �� `t-ch a and r�� ��t-yaa). The fact that some cultures have different words to indicate envy already indicates there might be different types (cf., Breugelmans & Poortinga, 2006). Languages that have multiple words for envy typically distinguish between a benign and a malicious form.2 Although in English the default form of envy seems to be mali- cious envy, people often use it in a more positive very as well. People sometimes say ���I envy you��� to express that they are impressed and would like to also have what the other has. Based on these observations, we investigate whether the postulated two different emotional experiences of envy actually exist in languages and cultures with one as well as with two words for envy. To this end, we propose a new methodology based on the experiential content of the emotions combined with latent class analysis. Analytical Approach To determine how envy can result in the very different actions of moving up or pulling down, we build on the idea that emotions have a pragmatic function by preparing and motivating a person for certain actions, by means of the specific feelings that become activated (Arnold, 1969 Frijda, 1986 Zeelenberg & Pieters, 2006). To this aim, we analyzed the experiential content of envy, using a componential approach (Frijda, Kuipers, & Ter Schure, 1989 Roseman, Wiest, & Swartz, 1994). Figure 1 provides an overview of the steps we took to analyze the two envy types. We first tested for differences between the two envy types in a culture that uses separate words and then deter- mined whether the same differences can be found in cultures with a single word for envy. We conducted the first study in the Netherlands, which has different words for the two envy types: benijden (benign envy) and afgunst (malicious envy). Etymolog- ically, benijden stems from the medieval word beniden, which means being unable to bear something, and afgunst stems from niet gunnen, which means to begrudge (Dutch Etymologic Online Dictionary, 2007).3 The different origins of these Dutch words are consistent with the idea that the envy types indeed are likely to have different meanings. We first conducted a pilot study (N 48) to determine whether these different Dutch words for envy were actually perceived to be different. Participants read the following story: Niels and Rik play in the first team of a good soccer club. Marcel, a teammate of Niels and Rik, is selected to play for a professional team. Niels feels benign envy toward Marcel [benijdt Marcel], Rik feels malicious envy [Rik is afgunstig]. Next, participants indicated whether they thought Niels or Rik would be more likely to feel or perform in a given way. The results in Table 1 reveal that afgunst is associated with the pulling-down motivation, whereas benijden is associated with the moving-up motivation. This supports that indeed the two Dutch words reflect different forms of envy and that it is useful to pursue further testing. In Study 1, Dutch participants described a personal experience of benijden (benign envy) or afgunst (malicious envy), after which they responded to questions about the experiential content of their experience. We expected the experiences of benign and malicious envy to differ from each other and from the related emotions of admiration and resentment. The next step was to use these key experiential content compo- nents to investigate whether the two envy types are also present in cultures with a single word for envy. In Study 2, we asked U.S. participants to recall an envy experience and answer questions regarding this experience. We used latent class analysis that de- tects different patterns of responses from a common set of data (McCutcheon, 1987 Vermunt & Magidson, 2005). If we were to find the same distinct pattern as in Study 1, it would constitute strong support for the existence of the two envy types, even in a language using a single word to describe both. Finally, Study 3 is a replication of Study 2 in another language and country that has one word for both types of envy, namely Spain. 2 Translations of envy were derived from informal communications with students and faculty from the various countries and checked via Web dictionaries. 3 Checking the translation website lookwayup.com, both benijden and afgunst translate into envy. Translating envy back to Dutch gives a few more possible translations, of which benijden and afgunst are by far the most common ones. 420 VAN DE VEN, ZEELENBERG, AND PIETERS