OxyMean?

What if the same thing that makes you care a lot about other people makes you care a lot about how other people are doing compared to you? That is, whether they've got more money, a better marriage, or a nicer house?

So, while you'd save your neighbor's kid from drowning, you'd kinda be wishing you had as nice a pool as they did while you were doing it. Or, if your pool is bigger, well, all the better, ha ha.

What if caring has a flip side, a dark side. Empathy plus envy...enpathy.

Or, what if the same indifference that makes you not give two hoots if your neighbor lives or dies also makes you never compare your yard/barbeque/car/pool/life with theirs?

Such are the conclusions being drawn by researchers at the University of Haifa, who are finding that oxytocin -- the much-celebrated bonding and empathy-promoting hormone -- may boost the intensity of social emotions generally -- including some not-so-nice ones.

Say it ain't so, oxy! But it makes sense. The least empathic people I know never compare themselves to other people, other people, what other people?