I'm envious of a friend whose boyfriend frequently does nice things for her: bringing her soup when she's sick and surprising her with a weekend getaway and a pricey handbag she'd been coveting. My boyfriend is a nice, reliable, loving guy. I'd considered myself lucky to have him, but now I'm worried my "good-boyfriend" standard is too low.

--Comparison Shopping

A woman feels loved when the man she's with does those little things that say "thinking of you" -- as opposed to "spent all day forgetting I had a girlfriend."

Not surprisingly, you envy your girlfriend who gets those little (and bigger) signs. Envy gets a bum rap as a toxic emotion. (It can have toxic effects when the envious try to even things out by sabotaging those doing better.) However, evolutionary social psychologist Bram Buunk's research suggests envy is actually "adaptive": functional -- a sort of alarm clock for yearning and ambition, alerting us to others' higher achievements (or groovier stuff) and motivating us to nab the same (or more) for ourselves.

Men are not cryptographers, and they are particularly bad at translating women's nonverbal signals like pouting -- if they notice them at all. Tell your boyfriend what you want -- sweetly, not scoldingly -- in the context of "what would make me really happy." Chances are you'll need to tell him a few times to get him to come around. When he does, reinforce future come-arounds by telling him how happy he's made you, how much it means to you. (Doing this while tearing off his clothes, if you're so inspired, should make an even stronger impression.)

But say, even with reminders, your boyfriend drops by with soup or a latte just once and then forgets the whole deal. Sure, you could put him out with the recycling for some woman with lower "good-boyfriend standards" to pick up. However, you might reflect on ways he shows he cares: maybe giving you his coat when you're cold or fixing your car so you won't die in a fiery wreck. You might also consider that some men's apparent generosity reflects not love but the sense they're out of their league. If that's the case with your friend's boyfriend, the stream of soup, swag, and trips is just a campaign to delight-slash-distract her from dumping him -- a la, "Never put off till tomorrow goods-and-services-izing what could be in some other dude's arms two Thursdays from now!"

For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.