How to define the css :hover state in a jQuery selector?

Well, you can't add styling using pseudo selectors like :hover, :after, :nth-child, or anything like that using jQuery.

If you want to add a CSS rule like that you have to create a <style> element and add that :hover rule to it just like you would in CSS. Then you would have to add that <style> element to the page.

Using the .hover function seems to be more appropriate if you can't just add the css to a stylesheet, but if you insist you can do:

$('head').append('<style>.myclass:hover div {background-color : red;}</style>')

If you want to read more on adding CSS with javascript you can check out one of David Walsh's Blog posts.

I would suggest to use CSS over jquery ( if possible) otherwise you can use something like this

$("div.myclass").hover(function() {
  $(this).css("background-color","red")
});

You can change your selector as per your need.

As commented by @A.Wolff, If you want to use this hover effect to multiple classes, you can use it like this

$(".myclass, .myclass2").hover(function(e) { 
    $(this).css("background-color",e.type === "mouseenter"?"red":"transparent") 
})

Js Fiddle Demo

I know this has an accepted answer but if anyone comes upon this, my solution may help.

I found this question because I have a use-case where I wanted to turn off the :hover state for elements individually. Since there is no way to do this in the DOM, another good way to do it is to define a class in CSS that overrides the hover state.

For instance, the css:

.nohover:hover {
    color: black !important;
}

Then with jQuery:

$("#elm").addClass("nohover");

With this method, you can override as many DOM elements as you would like without binding tons of onHover events.

You can try this:

$(".myclass").mouseover(function() {
    $(this).find(" > div").css("background-color","red");
}).mouseout(function() {
    $(this).find(" > div").css("background-color","transparent");
});

DEMO