Benign and Malicious Envy Scale (BeMaS) Test

People who want to understand how comparison affects ambition, resentment, or reactions to successful others may use the Benign and Malicious Envy Scale (BeMaS) Test as a structured self-reflection tool. For readers reflecting on competitive feelings, this benign and malicious envy questionnaire organizes reactions to achievement comparisons without reducing them to a single pattern.

What This Assessment Explores

Comparison with another person’s achievements, qualities, or possessions can direct envy differently. One pattern turns discomfort into effort toward a desired standard. Another involves resentment, dislike, hostility, or a wish to deprive the envied person of an advantage. Because both tendencies may occur in the same person, the profile presents them separately rather than assigning one type.

Respondents can use this benign envy test to reflect on whether social comparison more often supports personal striving or intensifies negative feelings toward others.

The result reports these dimensions:

• Destructive Envy (5-30) measures hostile, unpleasant envy and a wish to deprive or bring the envied person down; scores from 5-14 are Low and 15-30 are High.
• Benign Envy (5-30) measures envy directed toward reaching another person’s level and improving oneself; scores from 5-15 are Low, 16-27 are Moderate, and 28-30 are High.

Methodology and Scientific Basis

Each statement uses six ordered options from Strongly disagree to Strongly agree. Items address two themes: striving to reach another person’s level or improve oneself, and hostile reactions such as dislike, resentment, or wanting to deprive someone of an advantage. The questionnaire presents separate results for these forms.

BeMaS (Lange & Crusius, 2015) distinguishes envy that encourages self-improvement from envy directed toward another person’s disadvantage. This questionnaire is conceptually consistent with that published instrument. The BeMaS source calls the hostile pattern malicious envy; here, the forms remain related but distinct responses to social comparison.

Kwiatkowska, Rogoza, and Volkodav (2022) examined BeMaS structure, reliability, and cross-national comparability across four countries. Lange and Crusius (2024) offer a later handbook treatment. Together, these sources document the published instrument’s distinction and help interpret the themes measured here.

Interpret the profile as a self-reported snapshot shaped by current mood, recent comparisons, social desirability, and self-awareness. The displayed categories are descriptive for this questionnaire, so the scores are most useful when considered alongside the situations and feelings that influenced the responses.