Sex differences in jealousy: The recall of cues to sexual and emotional infidelity in personally more and less threatening context conditions

We tested the prediction derived from the evolutionary view of jealousy that men preferentially recall cues to sexual infidelity, whereas women preferentially recall cues to emotional infidelity. This preferential recall was predicted to be more pronounced in a personally more threatening than in a personally less threatening context condition. In the personally less threatening context condition, the participants listened to a story about an anonymous couple spending an evening together; in the personally more threatening context condition, the same story referred to one’s own romantic relationship. Integrated in this story were five ambiguous cues each to sexual and emotional infidelity. As predicted, in a surprise recall test, men preferentially recalled cues to sexual infidelity, whereas women preferentially recalled cues to emotional infidelity. This preferential recall was significant for both men and women only in the personally more threatening context condition. D 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.