Comment: Getting Our Affect Together: Shared Representations as the Core of Empathy

Abstract

Empathy is a construct that is notoriously difficult to define. Murphy and colleagues argue for leaning into the construct's inherent fuzziness and reverting to what they term a classical definition informed by the observations of philosophers and clinicians: as a dynamic, “unfolding process of imaginatively experiencing the subjective consciousness of another person, sensing, understanding, and structuring the world as if one were that person.” Although consistent with some historical conceptualizations, this definition risks incorporating so many processes it would make empathy difficult to operationalize or distinguish from any generally socially sensitive interaction. Defining empathy instead as the attempted representation, or simulation, of another's subjective internal experiences (whether sensory, affective, or cognitive) would increase its clarity and empirical utility.

Authors Reply: Empathy and Creativity: Dangers of the Methodological Tail Wagging the Conceptual Dog

“…Main (2022) and Zahavi (2022) largely concurred with our primary argument regarding the incoherence and harm of the RIM definition; Marsh (2022) also agreed that the RIM definition is problematic and overly restrictive. Main (2022; also see Main & Kho, 2019) argued for a greater emphasis on the relational, interpersonal elements of empathy and also for greater appreciation of the way in which varying cultural factors will influence the functional meaning of empathy across different contexts.…”

“…The nature of the phenomenon can become conflated with the real-world benefits we hypothesize it to have, such as if we presume that all altruistic people must be highly empathic, that all poets must be highly creative individuals (cf. Barron & Harrington, 1981), or that empathy is “whatever callous people lack” (Marsh, 2022, p. 186).…”

“…In her comment, Marsh (2022, p. 185) suggested that an adequate and non-restrictive definition of empathy is “the attempted representation, or simulation, of another's subjective internal experiences.” This umbrella definition, helpfully depicted in Marsh’s Figure 1, would seem to encompass many of the different facet-level processes Zahavi distinguishes between, such as projection, inferential reasoning, imagination, and intuitive Steinian empathy. Although Marsh's definition seems to definitionally reduce empathy to a fleeting state experience, Marsh acknowledges that the functional outcome of empathy (understanding) may often require more sustained and/or dynamic processing: “Thus, failures of empathy often simply mean more information, time, and/or effort is needed to bridge the gap between minds, rather than that the observer is fundamentally uncaring, insensitive, unimaginative, or unobservant.” (p. 186).…”

“…As with defining creativity, our overarching view is that a definition of empathy should not lose sight of the higher-level function motivating interest in the construct. Our main worry about Marsh’s (2022) proposed definition is that, like the RIM definition, it reduces empathy to a fleeting state, by placing process-facilitating elements outside the definition, and it does not focus on the functional value of the construct. If empathy is merely any attempted representation of any subjective internal state of another, such as if a TV viewer makes an automatic, inaccurate, uncharitable representation of the motivation of an athlete kneeling in support of civil rights, that would be inconsistent with the meaning of empathy in most academic, clinical, and lay discourse.…”

Empathic concern motivates willingness to help in the absence of interdependence.

“…The present studies focus on empathic concern and helping behavior—constructs with a rich history of research in psychology both individually and in relation to each other (Batson, 2011). The defining features of empathic concern include (a) an emotional state that is elicited by and congruent with a target’s distress (though it need not be exactly isomorphic; Marsh, 2022; Murphy et al, 2022); (b) subsequent feelings of concern for the target; and (c) motivation to improve the welfare of the target in need. Empathic concern is the aspect of empathy referred to by the empathy-altruism hypothesis , which posits that people experience an emotional state congruent with the distress of a target, this affective correspondence elicits feelings of concern, and subsequently motivates people to alleviate the distress of the person in need (Batson, 2011).…”