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Romantic jealousy is conceptualized as the complicated feelings, ideas, and behaviors that include threats to one's self-worth or self-relation (White, 1981). This concept is mostly stated in the literature as the perceived threat of losing a precious relationship or of its deterioration (Altinmakas, 2011; Buss, Larsen, Westen, & Semmelroth, 1992; Clanton, 1981; Edalati & Redzuan, 2010; Pines & Friedman, 1998). When analyzing the performed studies, the concept of romantic jealousy is generally seen to have a negative connotation (Clanton & Lynn, 1977; Marelich, 2002; Pines, 1992). Within the dynamics of this concept lays a decrease of love within the marriage, resentment from the spouse, fear of the relationship getting worn out, anxiety, and/or emotions of self-worthlessness. Wreen (1989) states that at the center of romantic jealousy could be a lack of confidence, the fear of losing one's spouse, or emotional coldness, in particular. An individual who suffers from romantic jealousy can simultaneously experience emotions such as anger, unhappiness, and fear (Sharpseteen, 1991). This negative aspect of romantic jealousy may cause aggression and violence, and lead to divorce for some individuals. Additionally, romantic jealousy is noticed as an important possible reason of unhappiness and trouble for spouses, as well as being among the primary causes of divorce in unhappy marriages, domestic violence, and murdered spouses (Daly, Wilson, & Weghorst, 1982; Pines & Friedman, 1998). Freud states that jealousy is a universal emotion, as well as a trauma concealed during an individual's negative childhood and revived again in adulthood (Pines, 1992). In addition to this, Sullivan states that jealousy is an unpleasant emotion that may cause a deep feeling of inadequacy (Mathes, 1992); according to the theory of evolution, jealousy is an instinct with the aim of protecting relationships (Kenrick & Trost, 1997). According to transactional analysis, jealousy, values, beliefs, expectations, antecedents, and personality traits are formed through their relation with one's social environment (Bringle, 1995). Additionally, there are other approaches in the literature like the double-strike approach (DeSteno & Salovey, 1996; Harris, 2003), which refers to the difference between men and women in terms of the situation-specific ability of reasoning the explanation of romantic jealousy. This is akin to the strength-differentials approach, which states that men and women have different types of jealousy because of the strength differences between the two genders, not because of evolution, however, these strength differences are based on their self-esteem because men are more stronger than women about selfesteem (Mead & White, 1981, pp. 300-309 as cited in Demirtac-Madran, 2008).According to the evolutionary theory, men and women have basic differences between them in terms of jealousy (DeSteno, Bartlett, & Salovey, 2002). These are divided into two categories, sexual jealousy and emotional jealousy; the evolutionary theory defines sexual jealousy as a jealousy which occurs as a result of an individual knowing or suspecting that their spouse is having an affair with someone else. Emotional jealousy occurs as a result of one knowing or suspecting that their spouse is emotionally attached to someone else (Demirtac-Madran, 2008). In the literature, a number of studies have indicated that these two types of jealousy are experienced in different ways by men and women. Men experience more sexual jealousy while women experience emotional jealousy more (Edalati & Redzuan, 2010; Fussell, 2012; Varga, Gee, & Munro, 2011; Ward & Voracek, 2004). Shackelford and Buss (1997) designated seven behaviors that arouse emotional jealousy: a) relational dissatisfaction or loss of love (i.e., spouses who say they want to date other people); b) emotional neglect (i.e., spouses who forget special days or who stop expressing their love); c) unwillingness to spend time together (i. … |
