4 Psychological Traits Linked To Sexual Jealousy In Men

Study Finds Straight Men Are Most Likely To View Physical Cheating As Worse Than Emotional

Heterosexual men have long been known to react more strongly to sexual infidelity than emotional betrayal. Norwegian and American researchers, however, have discovered that sexual jealousy isn’t simply about being male. After examining 4,465 people, they report such feelings are shaped by where someone lands on four distinct psychological measures working together, each contributing independently to how people experience jealousy.

The research, published in Archives of Sexual Behavior, challenges the simplistic notion that men and women are psychologically opposite. Lead author Leif Edward Ottesen Kennair from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology found that sexual jealousy emerges from a specific combination: being male, having a very strong attraction to women, and scoring high on four masculinity indicators including childhood play preferences, occupational interests, thinking styles, and gender identity.

The 4 Psychological Measures Behind Jealousy

Researchers looked at four distinct characteristics traditionally associated with masculinity or femininity. First came childhood play behavior: did participants recall preferring trucks and roughhousing or dolls and quieter activities before age 12? Second, they examined thinking styles, specifically whether people naturally lean toward analyzing how things work versus understanding emotions. Third, they assessed job preferences, measuring attraction to typically male-dominated fields like engineering versus people-oriented professions. Finally, they asked participants how masculine or feminine they felt compared to others their age and sex.

These four measures didn’t always line up perfectly within individuals. Someone might score high on masculine childhood play but lower on analytical thinking, for instance. This variation matters because the research team discovered these traits function as separate controls rather than a single masculine-feminine switch. Among men, all four measures together predicted who they were attracted to, which in turn strongly predicted jealousy responses to imagined infidelity. In other words, these four characteristics predicted jealousy primarily through their connection to how strongly men were attracted to women, rather than directly influencing jealousy on their own.

The study asked participants to imagine four scenarios where a romantic partner became involved with someone else. Each scenario forced a choice: would sexual infidelity or emotional infidelity be more upsetting? Heterosexual men stood out dramatically. About 58% said sexual aspects would upset them more than emotional betrayal. Heterosexual women, by contrast, split about 31% on this measure. Among bisexual and gay men, the proportion dropped to around 30-40%, similar to women across all orientations.

Sexual Jealousy Peaks With Very Strong Attraction to Women

Perhaps most striking was the finding about how attraction patterns shaped jealousy in men. Researchers measured sexual attraction on a sliding scale rather than using only categories like “gay” or “straight.” Sexual jealousy in men rose primarily among those very strongly attracted to women, especially when attraction to men was low. The relationship wasn’t simply on-or-off. Rather, jealousy increased sharply only at the highest levels of attraction to women combined with the lowest levels of attraction to men.

This finding poses a puzzle. Theoretically, any man investing in children he believes are his own would benefit from avoiding affairs, regardless of whether he also experiences attraction to men. Yet the data showed that attraction to men, even at modest levels, shifted the focus away from sexual infidelity and toward emotional concerns.

Women showed a different pattern entirely. Among women, the four masculinity-femininity indicators predicted who they were attracted to but didn’t significantly predict jealousy responses. Women who scored high on masculinity measures and reported attraction to other women still focused primarily on emotional rather than sexual infidelity. This suggests jealousy works differently in men and women.

Bisexual men dating women presented another puzzle. Scientists expected these men should experience sexual jealousy identical to heterosexual men, since they face the same risks. Instead, bisexual men with female partners reported jealousy patterns more similar to gay men.

The researchers examined 31 bisexual men and 127 bisexual women currently in opposite-sex relationships, comparing them to heterosexual men and women in opposite-sex relationships. Heterosexual men scored higher on sexual jealousy than bisexual men with female partners, though the bisexual male group was relatively small. Heterosexual women and bisexual women with male partners, meanwhile, showed no difference. Kennair and colleagues note this unexpected finding may relate to differences in how much bisexual men invest in relationships or their relationship patterns, though the small group size means the finding needs replication.

Jealousy Changes With Age

The sex difference in jealousy responses narrowed with age. While younger heterosexual men showed the starkest contrast with heterosexual women, this gap gradually compressed across the lifespan. The gap between heterosexual men and women narrowed with age, and this pattern showed up only among heterosexuals, not sexual minorities.

The study drew participants from two sources: about 3,700 people from the general Norwegian population and about 800 from Norwegian LGBTQ communities. Participants ranged from age 16 to 80, with an average age of 35 years. About two-thirds reported being in a romantic relationship at the time of the study.

Study co-author David P. Schmitt from Kansas State University emphasized that these findings support viewing psychological gender as multidimensional rather than binary. Each of the four masculinity-femininity indicators showed only moderate connection with the others. They tended to operate somewhat independently.

This modest overlap suggests each measure develops somewhat independently, possibly shaped by different life experiences or biological factors. Childhood gender behavior, for instance, connected most strongly to the broader masculinity-femininity pattern for both sexes. But analytical versus emotional thinking showed the weakest connection, suggesting thinking style operates more independently than the other traits.

The researchers used mathematical modeling to test whether these four indicators together formed a meaningful pattern predicting both who people are attracted to and jealousy. Among men, the model showed that masculinity-femininity predicted attraction to women, which in turn predicted sexual jealousy. The masculinity-femininity measures had no direct effect on jealousy once attraction patterns were accounted for, suggesting the four measures influence jealousy primarily through their connection to sexual attraction patterns.

The modeling worked well for men but less clearly for women. Among women, masculinity-femininity predicted who they were attracted to but showed only a weak, barely significant direct link to jealousy responses. This suggests additional unmeasured factors likely influence how women experience jealousy.

In this sample, most people focused more on emotional than sexual infidelity. Higher sexual jealousy concentrated among men with very strong attraction to women and low attraction to men. Even heterosexual women, who also face costs from partner infidelity, don’t show the same shift toward sexual jealousy. This difference likely reflects different problems ancestral men and women faced regarding reproduction and raising children.

Emotional Vs. Physical Cheating

For relationship counseling, the findings suggest jealousy patterns emerge from multiple partially independent psychological systems that can be mixed and matched in various ways within individuals. Two men who both identify as heterosexual might experience jealousy quite differently depending on where they land across the four masculinity indicators and the strength of their attraction to women.

The study also reinforces that psychological sex differences, even when strong, shouldn’t be interpreted as absolute or inevitable. Nearly half of heterosexual men in this sample reported that emotional infidelity would upset them more than sexual infidelity across most or all scenarios. Individual variation within groups consistently exceeded variation between groups, as is typical for psychological traits.

Kennair and colleagues note several limitations. The study used imaginary scenarios rather than responses to real infidelity, which might produce different results. Participants recalled childhood behaviors from memory, potentially introducing errors. The sample came exclusively from Norway, limiting how well findings apply to other cultures. And while the bisexual male group with female partners revealed an intriguing puzzle, only 31 men met these criteria, requiring replication with larger samples.

Future research might examine why attraction to men so powerfully shifts jealousy focus away from sexual infidelity, even when men maintain strong attraction to women and invest in children. Understanding these mechanisms could illuminate not just jealousy but the broader picture of human sexuality and gender psychology.

Masculinity and femininity aren’t opposite poles on a single spectrum, nor are they merely social constructs. They emerge from multiple biological and developmental systems that typically line up in certain patterns but can be mixed and matched in varied ways. Sexual jealousy represents just one output from this system, requiring a precise mix to activate fully. For most people, regardless of sex or orientation, emotional betrayal remains the primary threat. Only a specific combination of factors shifts that focus toward sexual infidelity, and even then, nearly half of heterosexual men still prioritize emotional concerns over sexual ones.