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Expressions of pride may elicit others’ envy. In the consumer context, prior research has repeatedly demonstrated that such envy significantly affects consumers’ attitudinal and behavioural responses towards the object of envy. This paper aims to investigate whether this pride-envy relationship is bi-directional. Does being envied by others affect consumers’ self-directed feelings of pride, as well as their subsequent attitude towards a product (i.e. the object of envy)?

Three experiments examined how emotional reactions of envy from others may influence consumers’ subsequent affective and attitudinal responses towards their own product or purchase. The first experimental study (n = 129) examined whether exposure to benign envy from others evokes higher levels of authentic pride and positively influences product attitude. The second experiment (n = 159) investigated whether exposure to malicious envy from others evokes high levels of hubristic pride, and therefore, negatively influences product attitude. The third study (n = 80) was a quasi-field experiment seeking to provide further empirical support for the relationship between benign (vs malicious) envy and authentic (vs hubristic) pride and their effects on attitude.

The first experiment showed that when participants observed expressions of benign envy towards them, they expressed authentic pride, which ultimately increased positive attitudes towards the product. The second experiment showed that when participants observed expressions of malicious envy towards them, they expressed hubristic pride, which, in turn, reduced positive attitudes towards the product. The effect of malicious envy was further moderated by susceptibility to social influence, whereby the indirect effect of malicious envy on product attitudes was only significant among participants with high susceptibility. The third experiment demonstrated the relationship between benign (vs malicious) envy and authentic (vs hubristic) pride and the effects on attitude in a quasi-field study.

The present paper aims to fill a research gap by showing how being the recipient of others’ malicious or benign envy affects consumers’ self-directed feelings of pride, as well as their attitude towards a product that is the object of envy.

The current research is among the first to show that the emotional expressions of other consumers can influence existing consumers’ affective responses and attitudes towards a product. These findings highlight the importance of building a positive culture and community around brands and products, whereby other consumers’ consumption of the brand or product is perceived positively.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first empirical evidence demonstrating that others’ expression of benign (malicious) envy may lead to the self-feeling of authentic (hubristic) pride, which has a downstream effect on attitude towards the product.

Knowledge transfer is a crucial ingredient of employee innovation, yet affective work events may disrupt knowledge flow among employees. This study aims to investigate a previously overlooked, yet frequently occurring affective work experience, namely, that of being envied, and examine how perceptions of being envied may drive contrastive knowledge behaviors of sharing and hiding, which subsequently impact employee innovation. The study further examines how the zero-sum game beliefs of the envied individual may moderate these mechanisms.

This study builds on territorial and belongingness theories to delineate the contrastive motivations for knowledge hiding and knowledge sharing. This study tests a moderated mediation model through a multisource survey design involving 225 employees.

The results support the notion that perceptions of being envied are linked to both knowledge hiding and knowledge sharing; however, the indirect effect of being envied on innovation is observed only through knowledge sharing. The indirect positive link between perceptions of being envied and innovation via knowledge sharing is weakened when the envied employee holds high zero-sum game beliefs.

This study advances knowledge scholarship by identifying and testing the organizationally relevant but largely overlooked antecedent of being envied at work. The results provide useful insights to practitioners on how sharing or hiding knowledge serves as a strategic asset in response to being envied at work and how this may in turn impact employee innovation.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the phenomenon of knowledge transfer between employees and coworkers. That is, when and why employees engage in knowledge seeking or knowledge sabotage when confronted with coworkers with higher relative overqualification.

This study collected survey data from 315 employee-coworker pairs in East China at three-time points.

The results showed that when the cooperative goal interdependence between employee and coworker is high, the perception of coworker’s relative overqualification will cause benign envy of employees, which in turn promote employees to engage in knowledge seeking from coworker. However, when the competitive goal interdependence between employee and coworker is high, the perception of coworker’s relative overqualification will cause malicious envy of employees, which in turn promote employees to engage in knowledge sabotage toward coworker.

This research not only expands the theoretical perspective and outcomes of relative overqualification but also enriches the mechanism of knowledge seeking and knowledge sabotage. Meanwhile, this study also provides practical guidance for enterprises to reduce knowledge sabotage.

The purpose of the study is to explore novel antecedents to workplace envy. The authors explore the role of workplace ostracism (WO) as a contextual antecedent in triggering envy, as well as the mediating effects of metacognitive resources (MR) and dimensions of social perception (DSP) as cognitive antecedents. The authors integrate affective events theory, social comparison theory and schema theory to develop their arguments.

Using the survey approach, the authors recruited 490 professionals employed in Egypt and validated the proposed model and hypotheses in structural equation modelling (SEM).

The results show a significant relationship between WO and workplace envy. Additionally, metacognitive experiences (MEs) and warmth mediate the relationship among them.

By addressing how WO is a predictor of envy, this study is among the few to consider social-related events as predictors of envy. Additionally, the study is one of the first that has extended affective events theory to explore the role of an individual's cognition in generating envy.

Drawing from social comparison theory, this study investigates the factors influencing benign or malicious envy toward influencers and the effects of envy on social media users' choice of endorsed or rival brands.

A sample of 453 social media users was obtained to examine the research model.

Homophily and symbolism positively affect both benign and malicious envy. Credibility affects benign envy positively but malicious envy negatively. Deservingness affects malicious envy negatively but exerts no effect on benign envy. Benign envy has a greater influence on choosing brands endorsed by influencers than it does on choosing rival brands; these effects are more substantial under conditions of high perceived control. By contrast, malicious envy significantly affects the choice of purchasing rival brands; however, this effect is not influenced by perceived control.

This study unveils a key aspect of the endorser–follower relationship by analyzing the effect of envy toward social media influencers on followers' intention to purchase endorsed or rival brands. This study identifies the differential effects of two types of envy on brand choice.

Based on the self-evaluation maintenance model and social comparison theory, the purpose of this study is to test a novel model to explore the influence of competitive psychological climate on knowledge withholding of employees with the mediating role of envy. This study also investigated when the effect of climate on envy is more pronounced by assessing the role of a narcissistic personality.

The authors collected time-lagged data from 376 employees working in UAE national banks to test the model.

The findings of this study showed that a competitive psychological climate indirectly affects knowledge withholding behaviour because such a climate enhances the emotional response of employee envy. In a competitive climate, upward social comparisons are likely to be heightened, resulting in employee envy and knowledge withholding because knowledge is used as leverage to gain self-control and self-worth in the organisation. This effect of such a climate on employee envy was found to be stronger when employees have a narcissistic personality.

The findings offer practical insights to managers and practitioners on the importance of managing the competitive climate cautiously to address the likelihood of knowledge withholding behaviour among employees at work.

Employees compete for organizational resources as scarcity of resources has always been a critical issue in organizations. Since every employee cannot get equal pay raises, promotions and other incentives, therefore, they start feeling competition in the workplace which may further lead to negative outcomes such as envy. The purpose of this study is to investigate the negative consequences of the competitive psychological climate in the hospitality industry. The authors further intend to familiarize with the envy reducing mechanism.

Drawing on social comparison theory our study intends to explain the role of competitive psychological climate in workplaces. The authors utilized an exploratory qualitative research approach and surveyed through semi-structured interviews of the hospitality professionals working in the star hotels in Pakistan.

The authors’ findings reveal that there is a huge psychological competitive climate in the hotel industry in Pakistan. The psychological competitive climate leads to workplace envy among workers which further results in poor employee performance. The authors further found the role of personality traits in affecting employees' envious feelings.

Despite the fact that this study only examined the star-category hotels in Pakistan and its findings may not be representative of the whole hospitality industry, it offers a clear illustration of the effect that competitive climate can have on individuals in the form of workplace envy.

The authors examined the dark side of the competitive climate in the hospitality industry which was overlooked in the literature. The study highlights key research implications and sets the future agenda for research in the hospitality industry.

The present investigation aimed to evaluate the influence of envy on the predisposition to innovative behavior, starting from a conceptual model that considers not only the direct influence of envy but its indirect influence through ostracism and alignment with the negative behaviors of superiors.

Using a survey applied to 168 individuals, a conceptual model was developed based on the relationship ignored in the literature between envy and innovative behavior. The model was validated using the multivariate statistical technique of structural equation modeling with partial least squares estimation (Partial least squares structural equation modeling [PLS-SEM]).

The results of the study suggest that envy not only has a direct positive influence on alignment with negative boss behaviors and ostracism, but also an indirect influence on ostracism mediated by alignment with negative boss behaviors. Another important result of the present investigation refers to the negative effect of envy on the predisposition to innovative behavior. The results suggest that the greater the envy, the lower the innovative behavior.

This research provides evidence that envy can act as a barrier to innovation by triggering counterproductive behaviors such as ostracism and a decrease in predisposition to innovative behaviors, either due to innovative individuals prematurely exiting the organization or due to them lessening/dampening their innovativeness to avoid the negative consequences. Given this scenario, it becomes necessary to increase managerial awareness on the subject to manage negative emotions to promote the conditions for organizational innovation.

The present research contributes in both practical and theoretical ways to understanding the effects of envy on the predisposition to innovative behavior. Adding to this, this research represents a conceptual advance by linking envy to innovative behavior, providing a promising avenue for extending the psychological relevance of the envy construct to organizational and management studies, which are generally positive, normative and outcome-oriented.

While envy has been widely explored in psychology literature, theoretical understanding of the effects of envy on consumers’ emotional responses to brands is promising but under explored. Therefore, this study aims to apply cases of envy and psychological distance to consumers to examine whether the style of brand storytelling can moderate brand preference.

Three experimental studies were conducted to test the hypotheses. Experiment 1 investigated the effect of envy on consumer evaluations of an advocated brand, through viewing a series of advertisements that varied in brand storytelling styles. A total of 104 working students were randomly assigned to a 2 (brand storytelling: underdog vs top dog) single factorial design. Experiment 2 investigates the effect of envy on consumer evaluations of the advocated brand through viewing advertisements that varied in psychological distance. A total of 108 working students were randomly assigned to a 2 (psychological distance: proximal vs distant) single factorial design. Experiment 3 investigated the effect of envy on evaluations of the brand through viewing advertisements that varied in brand storytelling style and psychological distance. A total of 208 working students were randomly assigned to a 2 (underdog vs top dog) × 2 (proximal vs distant psychological distance) between-subject factorial design.

Results demonstrate that for consumers experiencing benign and malicious envy, advertisements characterized by brand storytelling (underdog vs top dog) and psychological distance (proximal vs distant) will elicit differential brand preferences.

This research takes up the call to address the limited attention given to envy in the context of brand advertising. Specifically, this research aims to explore how consumer envy influences brand preference and the role of moderating effects such as brand storytelling and psychological distance in this context.

The purpose of this paper is to assist service management academics and providers of positional services (i.e. services that provide status attainment benefits to consumers) to better understand how the envy reflex of outperformed consumers operates as an endemic emotional theme that, if properly managed, can be harnessed to improve consumer engagement outcomes.

The objectives of the research were addressed via two quantitative studies. In a preliminary descriptive study, the types of services consumers classify as “positional” were identified (n=351) and a measure of consumer perceived positional value was developed (n=179). In the main study, a 2 × 2 between-subjects quasi-experimental design was adopted using a sample of positional service consumers (n=265) with the data analysed via SEM and two-way MANCOVA.

The main study found a significant mediation effect of the envy reflex on the relationship between consumer perceived positional value and the overall likelihood of an engagement intention for outperformed positional service consumers. In addition, specific engagement intentions were predicted for outperformed consumers with a high envy reflex after considering how deserving they perceived a superior performer to be.

This research contributes to the burgeoning scholarly interest in the envy reflex as a consumption emotion by demonstrating its influence on consumer engagement outcomes. The research also demonstrates how tactics informed by appraisal theories of emotion can be used to manage endemic emotional themes in service environments to improve engagement outcomes.