Benign and Malicious Envy Scale

Abstract

The Dispositional Benign and Malicious Envy Scale (BeMaS) is a 10-item psychometric instrument designed to measure individual differences in the stable tendency to experience dispositional envy. Developed by Lange and Crusius (2015), the scale successfully differentiates between two distinct motivational responses to superior comparison standards: benign envy and malicious envy. The BeMaS provides a crucial tool for assessing personality differences in how individuals cope with feelings of inferiority in social comparison situations.

The scale is composed of two subscales, each containing five items. Benign envy is characterized by a constructive motivation to invest effort and improve oneself to match the envied person’s success, whereas malicious envy involves destructive impulses aimed at reducing the envied person’s advantage or causing them harm.

Keywords

Dispositional Envy, Benign Envy, Malicious Envy, Social Comparison, Personality, Psychometrics, Self-improvement, Destructive Motivation.

Authors

Jens Lange, Jan Crusius

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Purpose

The primary purpose of the BeMaS is to provide a reliable and valid measure for assessing the inherent tendency of an individual to respond to envy-eliciting situations in either a constructive or destructive manner. By separating benign envy from malicious envy, the scale facilitates a nuanced understanding of how individuals manage feelings of inferiority resulting from upward social comparison.

This critical differentiation allows researchers to disentangle the varied motivational and behavioral consequences associated with envy. The scale is highly valuable in studies exploring achievement motivation, social dynamics, and moral psychology, helping to determine which form of envy predicts positive striving versus antagonism and ill will.

Construct

The BeMaS measures the overarching construct of dispositional envy, conceptualizing it as a frustrating emotion that arises when an individual lacks another person’s superior quality, achievement, or possession. The scale is built upon a robust theoretical framework that posits envy is not a monolithic emotion but rather a phenomenon with two distinct motivational components:

• Benign Envy: This subscale measures the tendency to react to superiority with a constructive motivation. It entails the desire to invest greater effort to achieve the same level of success as the envied person, leading to upward mobility and self-enhancement.
• Malicious Envy: This subscale captures the tendency to react destructively. It motivates actions or wishes aimed at harming the envied person or reducing their advantage (i.e., leveling them down). This form is associated with ill will, resentment, and a desire for the other’s misfortune.

Validity

The development of the BeMaS (Lange & Crusius, 2015) established strong evidence for its construct validity. The two-factor structure successfully replicated prior theoretical distinctions between benign and malicious forms of envy, suggesting excellent internal differentiation and theoretical alignment.

Furthermore, the scale has demonstrated strong discriminant validity by showing differential patterns of association with established measures of personality and motivation. For example, scores on the benign envy subscale typically correlate positively with measures of conscientiousness and achievement striving, while scores on the malicious envy subscale are often associated with hostility, neuroticism, and aggression, confirming that the subscales measure distinct psychological processes.

Reliability

The BeMaS exhibits high internal consistency, which is a key indicator of reliability. In the foundational studies, both the benign envy subscale and the malicious envy subscale typically demonstrated robust Cronbach’s alpha coefficients (generally exceeding .80), indicating that the items within each subscale reliably converge to measure the intended underlying construct.

The scale also possesses adequate test-retest reliability over time, suggesting that individual differences in dispositional envy, as captured by the BeMaS, are stable personality traits rather than transient emotional states. This stability reinforces its utility for longitudinal research in personality and social psychology.

Factor Analysis

The structural integrity of the BeMaS was confirmed through confirmatory factor analysis during its development. The analysis supported the theoretical model of two distinct, yet correlated, factors of envy. The scale is strictly composed of 10 items, which load cleanly onto two independent subscales of five items each.

This clear two-factor structure—representing benign envy and malicious envy—empirically validates the core premise that these two forms of envy are separable dimensions, thereby allowing researchers to study their unique predictive power regarding motivation, well-being, and social interaction.

Instrument

Test Type: Self-report Personality Scale

Format: 10 items, 6-point Likert Scale (ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 6 = strongly agree)

Language Available: English (Original), German. Due to its open license, numerous translations may exist.

Population Group: General Adult Population

Age Group: Adolescents and Adults (typically 18+)

Population Details: Suitable for use with non-clinical populations in social, personality, and organizational psychology research.

Test Methodology: The scale responses are scored by averaging the items corresponding to the benign envy and malicious envy subscales, respectively. This produces two separate scores reflecting the dispositional tendency toward each type of envy. Sample scoring code using SPSS syntax is provided by the authors.

Keywords

BeMaS, Envy Measurement, Social Comparison Theory, Achievement Motivation, Psychological Assessment, Dispositional Trait.

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Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: Not provided in source content.

Affiliation Email addresses: Not provided in source content.

Correspondence Address: Not provided in source content.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

Test Year: 2015 (Publication of foundational research)

Permissions and Copyright: The scale is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY 4.0). This open license permits researchers to use, adapt, and share the scale and its translations freely without seeking additional consent from the authors, provided appropriate attribution is given.

Fee: The scale is available free of charge for academic and research use.

Reference’s

Lange, J., & Crusius, J. (2015). Dispositional envy revisited: Unraveling the motivational dynamics of benign and malicious envy. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 41(2), 284–294. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167214564959

Additional scoring information and sample code are available here.

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Items of the Benign and Malicious Envy Scale

IMPORTANT: The following scale items must be preserved in their original language and must not be changed in any way.

The scale consists of 10 items answered on a 6-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree to 6 = strongly agree). The instruction text provided to participants is:

Below, you will find statements related to situations when you lack another’s superior quality, achievement, or possession and you either desire it or wish that the other lacks it. Please indicate for every statement how much you agree or disagree with it. There are no right or wrong answers. Don’t hesitate to indicate the first answer that comes to your mind.

The scoring key, based on item order 1 through 10, is:

• Benign Envy Items: 1, 3, 4, 7, 9
• Malicious Envy Items: 2, 5, 6, 8, 10

The items are as follows: