Envy—such a brash feeling we have all experienced at some point since a young age. An article from New York Magazine recently shed light on a study about envy and how the things we may be envious of can change as we age. “Envy Across Adulthood: The What and the Who,” published in Basic and Applied Social Psychology, studied participants ranging from ages 18 to 80, and the authors, Nicole E. Henniger and Christine R. Harris of the University of California, San Diego, found constant sources of envy among the different age groups.
In people younger than 30, Henniger and Harris found that 40 percent envied other people’s successful romantic relationships. Other causes of envy for participants under 30 were other people’s physical appearance and their social status. For participants in their 30s, the feeling of envy for people’s romantic relationships decreased to 24 percent and decreased even more to 16 percent for participants in their 40s.
Overall, the study shows how envy shifts from love and social status to career and money for people in their 30s and 40s. However, the results also show how money is the constant cause of envy throughout the different age groups and how this type of envy increases as people get older. Now, that’s something to think about.
