Attaches a change event to the select that gets the text for each selected option and writes them in the div. It then triggers the event for the initial text draw.

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<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd"> <html> <head> <script src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-latest.js"></script> <script> $(document).ready(function(){ $("select").change(function () { var str = ""; $("select option:selected").each(function () { str += $(this).text() + " "; }); $("div").text(str); }) .change(); }); </script> <style> div { color:red; } </style> </head> <body> <select name="sweets" multiple="multiple"> <option>Chocolate</option> <option selected="selected">Candy</option> <option>Taffy</option> <option selected="selected">Caramel</option> <option>Fudge</option> <option>Cookie</option> </select> <div></div> </body> </html>
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