Empathy

According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, empathy is: 1. the imaginative projection of a subjective state into an object so that the object appears to be infused with it. 2: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner; also: the capacity for this. (Empathy, 2012)

The Oxford Dictionary points out the common confusion people have about the words empathy and sympathy. Empathy means “the ability to understand and share the feelings of another’” whereas sympathy means “feelings of pity and sorrow for someone else’s misfortune”. (Empathy, 2012) In short, empathy is the highest level of

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understanding the feelings of another, whether positive or negative feelings. It is not about feeling happy or sorry “for someone else”, it is “being that person” and feeling however he feels.

A survey done by Paul and Serpell (1993) showed significant positive correlations between childhood involvement with companion animals and concern and empathy for companion animals, other animals, and human beings in adulthood. Members of organizations concerned with animal welfare, as well as environment organizations, reported greater pet involvements during childhood than non-members. Vegetarianism was also highly linked with pet experience in childhood.

In a survey using postal questionnaires, Paul (2000) found a significant but modest correlation between the two scales: Questionnaire for the Measurement of Emotional Empathy (Mehrabian and Epstein 1972) which measures empathy with humans, and Animal Empathy Scale which measures empathy with non-human animals. Different sources of variation were linked to human- and animal-oriented empathy in different level. Animal-oriented empathy was related to current ownership of pets and to the ownership of pets during childhood, while human-oriented empathy was related to current presence of children at home. Interestingly, pet owners and non-pet owners did not score much differently in human-oriented empathy. Similarly, child raiser and non-child raisers did not score much differently in animal-oriented empathy. Besides, Female participants scored significantly higher than the males in both scales, and older participants showed lower levels in both scales. The author’s hypothesis is that, as people age, physical and emotional sensitivity decrease. Elder people have “seen it all”

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from their life experience, so the same amount of stimuli and arousal for younger people do not produce the same amount of reactions and feedbacks from the elder ones. Paul concluded that more specific human targets and animal targets to be explored as variants in empathy in future empathy scale and studies. In support of this hypothesis, the author learned from own experience that having kept certain kinds of animals as companion animals make a significant difference in empathy toward those particular kinds of animal, especially the ones that the author has or had close bond with.

The experiments done by Mehrabian and Epstein (1972) provided evidence that highly empathic people aggressed less toward the objects when the negative emotional feedbacks serve as an inhibitor of anger. Also, highly empathic people are more likely to engage in altruistic helping behavior toward others. Krebs (1970) in Mehrabian and Epstein concluded that altruistic behavior is a correlate of empathic tendency, which is determined by subject’s liking of the object, similarity of the object to the subject, and the dependency of the object. Although Mehrabian and Epstein found empathic tendency to be the only correlate of helping behavior, it can be hypothesized that people are more likely to empathize animals because animals are dependent, vulnerable and needy.

A study of Asione, Latham, Worthen (1985) found significant grade and gender differences in a one-year school-based intervention of a relatively weak intensity (10 hours of instruction in a school year). As a follow-up, Ascione (1992) assessed the impact of a more intense (minimum of 40 hours of instruction in a school year) year-long, school based humane education program and found that the program

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enhanced more humane attitudes toward animals and greater empathy toward other children, with the effects differ from grade to grade. The program achieved better results in older students (grade 4 and 5, particularly grade 4) than younger ones (grade 1 and 2). Fitzgerald (1981) and Cameron (1983) in Ascione suggested that a more focused and intensive classroom presentation, which could be as short as one single class session, can have a positive impact on older students. With presentations fewer than three hours, Hein (1987) in Asione found significant increase in humane attitudes from grade 2 to 4, but no change in grade 5. Inconsistent with the findings of Paul and Serpell (1993) and Paul (2000), Asione (1992)’s result showed that pet ownership was not a significant factor of enhancing children’s attitudes toward animals; however, Asione urged that the quality of the relation between child and companion animal be examined in future studies.

As Samuels (2007) pointed out, children’s primary caretaker holds an important role in developing children’s empathy. Depending on how people react, children’s inborn empathy can be encouraged or discouraged. Developing empathy toward humans is not the same as developing empathy toward animals, so it is better to cultivate empathy wherever it is desired, and not to rely on generalization of empathy.

Identifying the difference between humans and non-humans, understanding animals’

feelings and emotions through their behaviors are part of the learning process. Empathy alone is not enough, and sometimes one can cause harm due to lack of knowledge and experience even though he means well.

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