Empathic Concern and the Desire to Help as Separable Components of Compassionate Responding

Ministero, Lauren M.; Poulin, Michael J.; Buffone, Anneke; DeLury, Shane S.

doi:10.1177/0146167217741345

Cited by 21 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…Values matter as well: innumeracy does not Ends of empathy 39 emerge for environmentalists (i.e., who may place more value on animal welfare; Markowitz et al, 2013) or collectivists (i.e., who may place more value on large numbers; Kogut, Slovic, & Västfjäll, 2015). Recent work replicates motivational approaches to compassion collapse (Ministero et al, 2018): actively instructing people to engage in perspective-taking eliminates the collapse of empathic concern, and encouraging people to self-affirm their values eliminates the collapse of the desire to help large numbers, the latter pattern suggesting a process of goal reprioritization. More broadly, while a capacity explanation may seem to explain diminishing empathic returns for larger numbers, it seems less able to explain why empathy would decrease.…”

Section: Empathy and Innumeracymentioning

confidence: 98%

The ends of empathy: Constructing empathy from value-based choice

Cameron¹,

Cunningham²,

Saunders³

et al. 2017

Preprint

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Empathy, or the ability to understand and resonate with the experiences of others, has long been considered by philosophers and scientists to be an important part of human morality. We present a new framework that explains empathy as resulting from motivated decisions. Drawing on models of cybernetic control, value-based choice, and constructionism, we suggest that empathy shifts depending on how people value and prioritize conflicting goals. We generate novel predictions about the nature of empathy from the science of goal pursuit, and address its apparent limitations. Empathy appears less sensitive to suffering of large numbers and out-groups, leading some to suggest that empathy is an unreliable ethical guide. Whereas these arguments assume that empathy is a limited-capacity resource, we suggest that apparent limits of empathy reflect byproducts of domain-general goal pursuit. Arguments against empathy reflect a misguided essentialism: they mistake our own choices to avoid empathy for intrinsic features of empathy, treating empathy as a capricious emotion in conflict with reason. We suggest that empathy results from a rational decision, even if its rationality is bounded, as in many decisions in everyday life. Empathy may only be limited if we choose to avoid pursuing empathic goals.Ends of empathy 3 "Empathy isn't just something that happens to us-a meteor shower of synapses firing across the brain-it's also a choice we make: to pay attention, to extend ourselves. It's made of exertion, the dowdier cousin of impulse." -Leslie Jamison (2014), The Empathy ExamsIn the summer of 2016, empathy went viral. The world learned about Harambe, a silverback gorilla in the Cincinnati Zoo who was shot and killed by zookeepers in an attempt to save the life of a child who had fallen into his enclosure. In the aftermath of the incident, people around the world expressed support for Harambe in a variety of ways, ranging from social media posts to charitable donations to Harambe tattoos. Empathy for Harambe became a meme in its own right. On the other hand, many people appeared to lack empathy for the zookeepers, the child, and the child's mother, to the point that some even issued death threats. This example reveals a broader point about empathy (and the lack thereof): it can feel effortless, contagious, a passion to which we are subject, rather than something we choose or control.Empathy-our ability to understand and resonate with the experiences of others-is typically considered an emotion, which can entail the conceptual baggage that many people associate with emotion. People often see emotions as passions that are out of our control, as something that happen to us. This idea has much precedent. The term derives from the Greek empatheia, which takes feeling or passion (pathos) and directs it at or into (em) someone else;this was adapted to the German Einfühlung ("feeling into"), and translated into English as empathy (Wispe, 1987). These traditions emphasize continuity of empathy with emotions, and in so doing, ca...

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Section: Empathy and Innumeracymentioning

confidence: 98%

The ends of empathy: Constructing empathy from value-based choice

Cameron¹,

Cunningham²,

Saunders³

et al. 2017

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Helping behavior. Consistent with Ministero, Poulin, Buffone, and DeLury [70] (2018), we administered the Cameron and Payne [71] 4-item measure to evaluate participants' helping behavior inclination. Participants answered this scale (e.g., "To what extent do you feel it is appropriate to give money" [to the person described in the scenario]; α = .84) on a 7-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 (not at all) to 7 (extremely).…”

Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Empathic concern. To evaluate empathic-related feelings toward the person described in each respective scenario, we used the 5-item measure originally developed by Cameron and Payne [71] and previously used by other researchers [70]. The responses to these items (e.g., "How touched do you feel" [toward the person described in the scenario]; α = .82) were measured on a 7-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (not at all) to 7 (extremely).…”

Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 99%

Connecting perceived economic threat and prosocial tendencies: The explanatory role of empathic concern

Alonso-Ferres¹,

Navarro‐Carrillo²,

Garrido‐Macías³

et al. 2020

PLoS ONE

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Recent research suggests that perceived economic threat constitutes a valid predictor of people's attitudes and behaviors. While accumulated empirical evidence has mostly underlined the deleterious psychological effects (e.g., reduced psychological well-being) of perceived economic threat in times of economic strain, we postulate that individuals experiencing higher economic threat linked to the Spanish economic crisis are more prone to engage in other-beneficial prosocial behavior. Across two independently collected community samples, we tested this theoretical formulation and examined the potential mediating roles of empathic concern (Studies 1 & 2) and identification (Study 2). Study 1 (N = 306) revealed that participants who descended in the social scale due to the negative national economic context were engaged in a larger number of helping behaviors over the last three months compared to participants who did not descend the social ladder-independently of several sociodemographic and ideological factors. Moreover, our data indicated these effects were driven by increased empathic concern. Study 2 (N = 588), in which two hypothetical helping-behavior scenarios were randomly administered (crisis-related vs. control), showed that participants under high perceived financial threat exhibited an undifferentiated pattern of prosociality. However, moderatedmediation analyses indicated that empathic concern explained the perceived financial threathelping behavior link in the hypothetical crisis-related scenario but not in the hypothetical control scenario. Together, these findings extend prior literature on the psychosocial effects of perceived economic threat and the determinants of other-oriented behavior. Implications of these findings and suggestions for further research are discussed.

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“…Intriguingly, the motivation behind the reappraisal appears to matter: Reappraisal motivated by hope has been shown to increase donation compared to reappraisal motivated by distancing (Brethel‐Haurwitz, Stoianova, & Marsh, ), suggesting that effects of reappraisal may be contingent on what goals the regulator is trying to achieve. Similarly, general skill in emotion regulation, although sometimes linked to higher empathy (Eisenberg, 2000), can also be linked to lower empathy (Cameron & Payne, ; Ministero et al, ).…”

Section: A Motivated Emotion Regulation Approach To Empathymentioning

confidence: 99%

Motivating empathy: Three methodological recommendations for mapping empathy

Cameron

2018

Social & Personality Psych

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Empathy has received much attention in psychology, philosophy, and neuroscience. In this article, I first discuss a motivated emotion regulation approach to empathy, outlining some recent advances in motivated empathy. I then discuss how this approach can advance three questions about empathy: (1) How should we assess the boundaries between empathy and other states? (2) How should we assess empathic ability and empathic propensity? and (3) How should we assess automatic and controlled propensities to empathize? In each case, I suggest that the motivated emotion regulation approach can suggest methodological innovations to reframe these questions and outline recommendations for advancing the science of empathy.

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Empathic Concern and the Desire to Help as Separable Components of Compassionate Responding

Cited by 21 publications

References 37 publications

The ends of empathy: Constructing empathy from value-based choice

The ends of empathy: Constructing empathy from value-based choice

Connecting perceived economic threat and prosocial tendencies: The explanatory role of empathic concern

Motivating empathy: Three methodological recommendations for mapping empathy

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