Gender Differences in the Relationship Between Empathy and Forgiveness

Toussaint, Loren; Webb, Jon R.

doi:10.3200/socp.145.6.673-686

Cited by 339 publications

(255 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Although we cannot completely rule out a contribution of age to this gender effect, we found no evidence for age ϫ gender interactions across gender groups or correlations within them for emotional empathy ratings. This gender difference in emotional empathy is also in agreement with other studies (Toussaint and Webb, 2005) and may reflect enhanced release of OT in women compared with men (Taylor et al, 2000).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 81%

Oxytocin Enhances Amygdala-Dependent, Socially Reinforced Learning and Emotional Empathy in Humans

Hurlemann¹,

Patin²,

Onur³

et al. 2010

J. Neurosci.

688

507

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Oxytocin (OT) is becoming increasingly established as a prosocial neuropeptide in humans with therapeutic potential in treatment of social, cognitive, and mood disorders. However, the potential of OT as a general facilitator of human learning and empathy is unclear. The current double-blind experiments on healthy adult male volunteers investigated first whether treatment with intranasal OT enhanced learning performance on a feedback-guided item-category association task where either social (smiling and angry faces) or nonsocial (green and red lights) reinforcers were used, and second whether it increased either cognitive or emotional empathy measured by the Multifaceted Empathy Test. Further experiments investigated whether OT-sensitive behavioral components required a normal functional amygdala. Results in control groups showed that learning performance was improved when social rather than nonsocial reinforcement was used. Intranasal OT potentiated this social reinforcement advantage and greatly increased emotional, but not cognitive, empathy in response to both positive and negative valence stimuli. Interestingly, after OT treatment, emotional empathy responses in men were raised to levels similar to those found in untreated women. Two patients with selective bilateral damage to the amygdala (monozygotic twins with congenital Urbach-Wiethe disease) were impaired on both OT-sensitive aspects of these learning and empathy tasks, but performed normally on nonsocially reinforced learning and cognitive empathy. Overall these findings provide the first demonstration that OT can facilitate amygdala-dependent, socially reinforced learning and emotional empathy in men.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 81%

Oxytocin Enhances Amygdala-Dependent, Socially Reinforced Learning and Emotional Empathy in Humans

Hurlemann¹,

Patin²,

Onur³

et al. 2010

J. Neurosci.

688

507

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Specifically, women scored higher in the TEQ, supporting similar findings that females tend to exhibit higher empathy than males (Spreng et al 2009;Totan et al 2012;Baltes , and Miu 2014;Youssef et al 2014;Toussaint and Webb 2005;Turnage et al 2012). These sex differences do not emerge in all empathy studies however, prompting Baldner and McGinley (Baldner and McGinley 2014) to state that self-report measures of empathy do not vastly differentiate among genders.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 51%

The Toronto Empathy Questionnaire: Reliability and Validity in a Nationwide Sample of Greek Teachers

et al. 2017

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Abstract:The present study examined the Toronto Empathy Questionnaire's (TEQ) validity and reliability in a sample of 3955 Greek teachers. In order to test the internal consistency reliability, the Cronbach's alpha coefficient was used and was found satisfactory at 0.72. The sample was randomly split and an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted in the even subsample, justifying the one-factor solution, with the only discrepancy of the low loading of an item. In the odd subsample a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed to confirm the one-factor model identified by the EFA. The chi square test (χ 2 ) of the model was significant (p < 0.05), while the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA), the comparative fit index (CFI) and the goodness of fit index (GFI) values were 0.078, 0.969 and 0.960, respectively, further supporting the model's fit. Student's t-tests and analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed that women, teachers with children of their own, those working full-time in public schools, those with students who needed special education, and those who had received mental health promotion training, scored higher. Additionally, multiple linear regression analysis revealed that sex, working status, having students who needed special education, and having attended mental health training courses were independently associated with TEQ score. The analyses confirmed that the Greek version of TEQ could be used for researches in Greek educators as a valid and reliable measure of teachers' empathy.

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“…Results indicated that female participants tended to agree more with negative stereotypes about older drivers as well measures to regulate road safety. This finding can be related to the above-cited findings by Toussaint and Webb (2007) about empathy and forgiveness in men and women. Our results are in favour of the assumption that due to a higher empathy than men, women have a higher consciousness of problems that exist with respect to older drivers.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 82%

“…In addition, previous data showed that female respondents agree less with punitive policies in general (Gault and Sabini 2000) suggesting that they would also agree less with restrictive measures such as driving restriction or driving licence removal. However, the reverse results about stereotypes and restrictive measures are also possible due to women having higher empathy than men but, contrary to them, present a not significant correlation between empathy and forgiveness (Toussaint and Webb 2007). Due to this, women could also show a higher awareness of problems that exist with respect to older drivers and consequently show a more negative evaluation of this group both with respect to negative stereotypes and measures to guarantee road safety.…”

Section: Awareness Of Age-related Changes and Coping With Driving-relmentioning

confidence: 93%

“The closer you get …”: age, attitudes and self-serving evaluations about older drivers

Ferring

Tournier

Mancini³

2015

Eur J Ageing

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The present study investigates the attitudes of older drivers and road safety measures with a particular focus on self-serving evaluations. Driving capacity is considered here as an indicator of awareness of age-related changes that may lead to a higher risk of self-stereotyping, motivating self-serving evaluations with advancing age. In order to test this notion, we used the perceived distance between one's chronological age and the age assigned to the social categories of ''older driver'' and ''old person'' as an indicator of age-group dissociation or identification, respectively. Self-serving evaluations were expected depending on the distance between chronological and subjective age estimates. In addition to this, we tested gender and age effects on the specific evaluations. A sample of 350 participants aged 19-88 completed an online questionnaire on negative and positive stereotypes about older drivers and road safety measures. Results indicated in general a more positive than negative view of older drivers; approval with measures to increase road safety by regulating older drivers was comparatively low. Female participants tended to agree more with negative stereotypes and regulative measures than male participants. Regression analyses revealed as well that increasing chronological age was associated with less agreement with negative stereotypes and measures for road safety. Differences between chronological age and subjective age estimates of when a person is old or an old driver were differentially related with the criteria. The closer the chronological age and subjective age estimates were the lower was the agreement with negative stereotypes and measures to regulate road safety. Findings underline in general that road safety enhancing efforts should avoid highlighting chronological age as the sole driving risk factor to circumvent negative stereotyping with ageing and unjustified driving cessation.

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Gender Differences in the Relationship Between Empathy and Forgiveness

Cited by 339 publications

References 31 publications

Oxytocin Enhances Amygdala-Dependent, Socially Reinforced Learning and Emotional Empathy in Humans

Oxytocin Enhances Amygdala-Dependent, Socially Reinforced Learning and Emotional Empathy in Humans

The Toronto Empathy Questionnaire: Reliability and Validity in a Nationwide Sample of Greek Teachers

“The closer you get …”: age, attitudes and self-serving evaluations about older drivers

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