Texas Tech University
Researcher: Jealousy is Normal at as Young as Six Months
Call it envy, greed, rivalry, resentment. Dub this oft-maligned emotion with whatever synonym you will; it is not a desirable trait. But is jealousy something we are born with, or is it something we develop over time?
According to Dr. Sybil Hart, children are capable of feeling those little stabs of spite before they can even say the word �green.�
Hart�s research establishes that children are capable of experiencing this complex emotion as young as six months of age � particularly in the infants of highly-involved and caring mothers.
This goes against conventional views of jealousy as a character flaw that emerges only later in development as the brain establishes more sophisticated cognitive functions and mother-child relationships are disrupted. Her findings also point to the controversial position that jealousy has an inborn biologically-based foundation.
Hart, associate dean of research for Texas Tech�s College of Human Sciences and an associate professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies, studies the importance of exclusivity in relationships by observing interactions in which a child is ignored in favor of another baby.
During testing, she instructs the mothers to disregard their own child while cooing over a realistic baby doll. The children, ranging from six months to one-and-a-half years old, typically display signs of discomfort that include staring, thrashing, flushing and coughing. Children typically become angry or sad. These behaviors and emotions indicate that children are capable of experiencing and communicating feelings of jealousy. Often, however, these signals are either missed or misunderstood by parents.
�There isn�t a facial expression with �jealousy� written on it,� she says. �The expressions can be subtle and it is hard to attribute them to jealousy. If you were looking for jealousy, what would you be looking for? We look at a child�s response to loss of exclusivity and contrast it with responses which are displayed in other situations which involve maternal unresponsiveness.�
Hart�s research has recently been featured in Newsweek Magazine and on CNN and ABC Radio. She has also published her findings in the book �Preventing Sibling Rivalry.�
In the next stage of her research, Hart and a coalition of researchers from her college and the Texas Tech Health Sciences Center will probe the physiological origins of jealousy.
In future experiments, Dr. Barbara Sawyer, a professor in the School of Allied Health, will measure cortisol levels in infant saliva. Cortisol, a stress hormone produced by the adrenal glands, reflects an infant�s level of distress. It could also pin down differences between children who appear angry, sad or unresponsive during the jealousy-evoking experiments. Additionally, Dr. Owatha "Tootie" Tatum, an assistant professor in the Department of Molecular Pathology, will search for genetic markers coinciding with the differing ways of expressing jealousy.
This could provide some huge clues to the origins and causes of jealousy. It could also help determine what exactly is going through a child�s brain while watching his/her mother cuddle another child � possibly a younger sibling.
-Cory Chandler