Researchers at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore were eager to investigate whether the feelings of jealously motivated consumers to buy things that were more likely to recapture the attention of their partners.
They conducted a series of five different experiments and the results showed that feelings of jealousy increase the desire for eye-catching products - such as a bright coloured coat instead of a dull-coloured one or a T-shirt with a big logo design versus a low-key design.
"Children can be jealous of a sibling's relationship with their parents or workers might be jealous of a colleague's close relationship with a supervisor," Huang said.
Researchers also found that the desire for eye-grabbing products disappeared when there was little chance that the product would be noticed by others in public.
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Participants who were experiencing feelings of jealously in one experiment were more likely to buy a noticeable gold lamp for their office, a public place.
However if they were buying a lamp for their bedroom, interest in a gold lamp versus a plain grey one was equal.
In one experiment, participants were asked to imagine that they had been invited to a party.
One group had been invited to a costume party organised by friends and the other group had been invited to a formal welcoming party for new staff members at their company.
Then they were asked to choose whether they had prefer to wear an ordinary pair of sunglasses to the party or a unique and eye-catching pair.
The researchers found that participants who were experiencing feelings of jealously opted to wear the eye-catching sunglasses to both types of parties, even though they could garner negative attention for this at a formal work party.
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