Free Romantic Jealousy: Causes, Symptoms, Cures by Ayala Malach Pines Page A

with someone they know and envy triggers the most jealousy, and an affair with someone they don't know and of whom they have a low opinion triggers the least jealousy.
    While the triggers and the actual experience of jealousy are similar in both groups, there are a number of differences between the relationships of self-described jealous and nonjealous people. Nonjealous people feel more secure in their relationships, expect them to last longer, and are more certain that their partners have never been unfaithful. By contrast, it appears that even when self-described jealous people have good reasons to feel insecure in their relationships and experience jealousy, many view their jealousy as a personality trait. They don't say, "1 feel jealous because my husband of thirty-five years has had an affair." They say instead, "I feel this intense jealousy because I am a jealous person." One response implies that the problem is a result of the situation and thus can be changed. The other implies that the problem is built into the individual's personality and thus is hard to change.
    Given the great agreement among people about what triggers jealousy and how it is experienced, it's amazing that some choose to explain it as a personality trait about which there is little they can do, while others explain it in the context of a particular situation about which they can do quite a lot.
    It is possible, of course, that some people view their jealousy as a personality trail because it explains behaviors that would otherwise be unacceptable. Sexual jealousy is widely accepted as grounds for moral indignation in our culture. "Feeling jealous" serves as an explanation or excuse for a wide range of hostile, bitter, and even violent actions. Without the legitimizing context of jealousy, these actions would be taken as symptoms of severe pathology and derangement (Wagner, 1976).
    Not surprisingly, people who describe themselves as jealous also tend to attribute more positive effects to jealousy and see it more positively overall than do people who view themselves as not jealous. For example, jealous people tend to believe that jealousy teaches us not to take each other for granted, makes relationships last longer, induces commitment, brings excitement to listless relationships, makes one's mate look more desirable, and makes one examine one's relationship.
    But although being "a jealous person" can be effective in excusing certain unacceptable behaviors ("That's why I don't want you to dance with anyone else"; "That's why I had a temper tantrum"), in the long run it causes more problems than it solves. The reason: It greatly reduces people's freedom to act and their ability to cope directly with jealousy triggers.
    Having said that, let me return to the question presented at the beginning of this chapter: Are you a jealous person? Whatever people's answer to this question is, they are usually very interested in learning about the unconscious roots of their jealousy-the subject of the next chapter.
    A Note to Therapists
     
     
    The Romantic Jealousy Questionnaire can be used as a diagnostic tool prior to individual therapy, couple therapy, or a jealousy workshop. It can also be used during therapy (starting with the most extreme experience of jealousy). At times, this is what brought the person or couple in to begin with. In these cases, the jealousy is likely related to the discovery of an affair.
    The discovery of an affair is a very traumatic experience for a couple. The betrayed spouse is likely to be experiencing posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms. Often, just naming the symptoms seems to help. It suggests that the jealous person is not crazy, just suffering from a known trauma. The treatment of this trauma can be done using cognitive, behavioral, systemic, or psychodynamic techniques suggested throughout the book.
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    The Unconscious Roots
of Romantic Jealousy
     
     
     
    No one who ... conjures up the most evil of those