Be careful when you surf Facebook, or your relationship status may go from ``married'' to ``it's complicated,'' researchers warn.

The more time you spend on the social networking site, the more likely you are to feel jealous, according to a study from the University of Guelph.

Amy Muise, lead author of the study, said the jealousy is caused by overexposing partners to triggers.

``You check your partner's (Facebook) page and you see a post from someone you don't know that says, `It was great seeing you last night,''' Muise said. ``Even though it could be something very innocent, it can easily be interpreted another way.''

The problem can become a vicious cycle, Muise said, when the jealousy spurned by ``Facebook creeping'' leads the ``creeper'' to search for more information that will, inevitably, fuel the jealousy even more.

The idea for this study was spawned by stories Muise heard from friends and students.

``They were all talking about the issues Facebook had created in their romantic relationships,'' she said.

The complaining students led Muise to wonder if she was teaching a classroom full of jealous people or whether there was actually something about Facebook that created jealousy.

The study, published in the CyberPsychology and Behaviour journal, examined 308 undergraduate students. About 75 per cent of the subjects were female and all of the respondents were ``Facebook friends'' with their current partner or a previous partner.

In real life, certain encounters can also trigger jealousy, Muise said.

Imagine you're with your partner and a good-looking stranger approaches, she said.

``You don't know your partner's history with this person or the nature of their relationship,'' Muise said.

In this situation, the partner is there to explain the relationship, she said.

But on Facebook, ``there's less context,'' Muise said. ``Sometimes there's none.''

Feelings of insecurity, which would otherwise be easily quashed when the relationship is explained in person, become more frequent and more intense online, Muise said.

One respondent summed up the problem: ``I was already a bit jealous and insecure, but I think Facebook has definitely made me much, much, much worse.''

Georgina Hobbs-Meyer, 24, is one of the victims of divorce sparked by Facebook jealousy.

According to an article in The Guardian, Hobbs-Meyer stumbled across her husband's Facebook correspondences with another woman.

``And once I was in, I was hooked. Their lusty e-mails touched on bad beat poetry, but were infused with textspeak, their coy cyberflirts rife with emoticons,'' Hobbs told the British newspaper.

Meanwhile, Britain's Daily Mail published a story in February about what the newspaper called the ``world's first divorce by Facebook.''

Emma Brady, 35, said she was ``shell-shocked'' when she heard from friends that her husband had posted their breakup on Facebook.

Brady told the newspaper she had no idea her husband wanted a divorce.