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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 26, 2012 2:30 PM
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I've thought a lot about the power of empathy. In my work, it's the current that connects me and my actual pulse to a fictional character in a made up story, it allows me to feel, pretend feelings and sorrows and imagined pain. And my nervous system is sympathetically-wired, and it conducts that current to you, sitting in a movie theatre. And to the woman sitting next to you, and to her friend, so that we all feel that it's happening to us at the same time. It's a very mysterious and valuable resource of the human species... I thought "what possible value, function could it serve in the Darwinian scheme of, you know, survival of the fittest and the strongest and the most heavily armed?" No, seriously, I thought, "Why? and how did we evolve with this weak, and useless passion in tact within the deep heart's core?" And the answer as I've formulated it to myself is that empathy is the engine that powers all the best in us.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 25, 2012 12:27 PM
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Recognizing that "Knowledge of the factors influencing attitudes toward animals has implications for prevention and intervention in cases of cruelty," researchers from Hofstra University and New York University examined how empathy and personality traits of 241 undergraduate students aged 18-46 affected their attitudes toward animals.. . The present study offers further evidence that empathy is a critical variable in both the understanding and treatment of animal abuse. Previous studies have shown high empathy among animal activists and low empathy in individuals who abuse animals. Here, using a general population (non-clinical and non-advocate) sample, the authors find that empathy (as distinguished from four other major personality variables) correlates with positive attitudes toward animals. by Ken Shapiro and Jill Howard Church
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 25, 2012 1:42 AM
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Newswise — One year ago, a landmark study led by Mohammadreza Hojat, Ph.D., research professor, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at Thomas Jefferson University, quantified a relationship between physicians’ empathy and their patients’ positive clinical outcomes, suggesting that a physician’s empathy is an important factor associated with clinical competence. The study was published in the journal Academic Medicine (March 2011 issue, http://journals.lww.com/academicmedicine ). Dr. Hojat’s team found that empathy can indeed be improved. In an article called, “Impact of a Workshop about Aging on the Empathy Scores of Pharmacy and Medical Students,” which was published in the current issue of the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 24, 2012 3:45 PM
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Here's an interview I did with Lorraine, she has a lot of hands on experience with empathy and conflict resolution. She's also a wonderful storyteller. Lorraine Segal & Edwin Rutsch: Dialogs on How to Build a Culture of Empathy
Sonoma State University - Assistant Professor. Teaches conflict resolution classes through extended education. A conflict coach, trainer, and mediator specializing in transforming communication and conflict for parents, teens, and others.
http://cultureofempathy.com
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 24, 2012 10:50 AM
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One year ago, a landmark study led by Mohammadreza Hojat, Ph.D., research professor, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at Thomas Jefferson University, quantified a relationship between physicians' empathy and their patients' positive clinical outcomes, suggesting that a physician's empathy is an important factor associated with clinical competence. The study was published in the journal Academic Medicine . As a follow-up to that landmark study, Dr. Hojat asked if it were possible to improve or even maintain physicians' empathy as a way to further enhance patient care. Dr. Hojat's team found that empathy can indeed be improved.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 23, 2012 4:54 PM
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Day 1 Session 2on Wisdom 2.0 on Livestream -
Talk and Interview: "Mindfulness and the Brain"
by Daniel Siegel, Mindsight Institute. Talk then interview by Michelle Gale Interview: "Wisdom, Games, and Mindfulness,"
with Jane McGonigal, Social Chocolate, and Kelly McGonigal, Stanford Talk: "Zynga Meets Zen: Exploring Attention, Technology, and True Connectivity"
with Eric Schiermeyer, Zynga, and Joan Halifax, Upaya Zen Center
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 23, 2012 1:42 PM
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Are humans hard-wired for hazing and cruelty? Or are we hard-wired instead for cooperation? Commentator Barbara J. King explains why the popular discourse about a hard-wired human nature fails to understand human behavior. That discourse promotes or suggests the idea that much of human nature is hard-wired; it's innate and pre-determined. It may touch on hard-wired hazing, as in the Chronicle piece (the term "hard-wired" is used in the article itself, which concerns the widespread "grip of hazing" on college campuses, not only in the interrogative headline)... In a weak sense, we humans do have some tendencies inherited from our prehistoric past. For many of us it can be harder to feel empathy and extend compassion beyond our closest social networks, out toward people we may judge as different from us.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 22, 2012 11:21 AM
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Science finally caught up to last week's episode of 30 Rock on Monday, when a biologist from Emory University announced the results of research which discredit the theory that humanity is nasty (and naughty) by nature. According to researcher Frans de Waal, new studies on animals from primates to mice show there is a biological basis for behavior such as cooperation. Until recently, the common scientific view was that humans, inherently "nasty" at their core, had been forced to develop an unnatural veneer of morality in order to function as a society.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 4:24 PM
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A study by a Washington and Lee University psychology professor has demonstrated that reading a short work of fiction can lead readers to empathize with the work’s characters, to detect subtle emotional expressions more effectively and to engage in pro-social behavior... Based on the results of the post-reading exercises, Johnson concluded that the more immersed the readers were in the story, the more empathy they felt for the characters. In addition, he found that the heightened empathy led to an enhanced ability to perceive subtle emotional expressions such as fear or happiness. Individuals who experienced higher levels of empathy were also nearly twice as likely to engage in pro-social, or helpful, behavior as individuals experiencing low levels of empathy.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 2:03 PM
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Charlotte Ashton visits NHS staff in Colchester, Essex, who are the first in the UK to receive compassion training. Can compassion get forgotten on a busy hospital ward? NHS staff in Colchester, Essex are the first in the UK to receive compassion training. During the course coach Andy Bradley explains which body language to avoid, how to listen properly, and why it is important to care for your colleagues. The scheme is a social enterprise, or a business with a primarily social purpose. Fifty-eight percent of social enterprises reported growth last year compared to 28% of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 1:55 PM
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As Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman notes in his recently published book, Thinking, Fast and Slow, our empathetic feeling for others—or at least for family members, friends, peers, or those we perceive to be victims—is a fast, involuntary response, much like envy or laughter. But empathy can sometimes lead to cognitive illusion. Primatologist Frans de Waal has commented that feelings of empathy and associated behaviors of altruism may have evolved in order to prompt humans to take care of their children. But once a faculty has evolved, it can be used for other purposes than the ones shaped by evolution. Unfortunately, humans’ evolved tendency toward empathy and altruism can, under some circumstances, be applied to the wrong cause. By Barbara Oakley, Guruprasad Madhavan, Ariel Knafo, and David Sloan Wilson
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 12:05 PM
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“Humans have a lot of pro-social tendencies,” Frans de Waal... Until just 12 years ago, the common view among scientists was that humans were “nasty” at the core but had developed a veneer of morality — albeit a thin one, de Waal told scientists and journalists from some 50 countries. But human children — and most higher animals — are “moral” in a scientific sense, because they need to cooperate with each other to reproduce and pass on their genes, he said. By Agence France-Presse More about Frans de Waal at
http://bit.ly/jn2OTe
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 11:54 AM
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Empathy, the ability to identify and to some extent feel another person’s emotions, is sometimes considered a sign of weakness; a fault that can interfere with the kind of upward mobility considered an ideal of a capitalist society. In his role as the amoral businessman Gordon Gekko in the 1987 film Wall Street, Michael Douglas famously stated “Greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures, the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge, has marked the upward surge of mankind (…)” However, with the exception of psychopaths (interestingly enough, some people theorize that psychopathy is an adaptive trait in corporate environments), people all share some degree of empathy. It’s the basis of the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do to you. BY MATT STAGGS
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 25, 2012 12:56 PM
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Machiavellianism is a term used to describe a person's tendency to deceive and manipulate other people for their personal gain. The MACH-IV test is a twenty-statement personality survey that is n... As I was contemplating writing this, I came across a story from Psychology Today, that was fascinating in its discussion of empathy as it relates to the Dark Triad, personality traits of narcissism, Machiavellianism and psychopathy, grouped together for their overlapping, negative characteristics. The common thread running through all three traits is low agreeableness and low empathy. by solodialogue
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 25, 2012 12:25 PM
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The majority of research investigating beliefs toward nonhuman animals has focused on vivisection or utilized populations with clear views on animal issues (e.g., animal rights activists). Minimal research has been conducted on what personality factors influence a nonclinical or nonadjudicated population's beliefs about the treatment of animals. The purpose of the present study was to examine the role of empathy and personality traits in attitudes about the treatment of animals in 241 undergraduate students. Results indicated that those with high levels of empathy held more positive attitudes toward animals and more negative beliefs about animal cruelty than those with low levels of empathy. Some differences in participants' specific attitudes toward animals were found. Limitations and implications for future research are reviewed. Authors: Eckardt Erlanger, Ann C.; Tsytsarev, Sergei V.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 24, 2012 8:03 PM
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..The anecdotal evidence linking intelligence and empathy for animals is certainly intriguing. Albert Einstein, whose diet was primarily plant-based, said, “Besides agreeing with the aims of vegetarianism for aesthetic and moral reasons, it is my view that a vegetarian manner of living by its purely physical effect on the human temperament would most beneficially influence the lot of mankind.” Another study showed that vegans and vegetarians have more empathy – for both animals and people – than meat-eaters do. Researchers in Europe recruited vegan, vegetarian and meat-eating volunteers and placed them into an MRI machine while showing them a series of random pictures. The MRI scans revealed that when observing animal or human suffering, the “empathy-related” areas of the brain are more active among vegetarians and vegans... by Paula Moore
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 24, 2012 3:38 PM
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Industrial Design content and community site - articles, discussions, interviews and resources. This is the second post in a 6-part series from Ziba's Industrial Design Director, Paul Backett, on rethinking design education. Read the Introduction to the series, Teach Less, Integrate More here. Great designers are great empathizers. It's what separates a design that has soul from one that's simply well-realized. In my experience as a design director and as a teacher, it's become painfully clear that the ability to connect with users is something design students must learn, as crucially as they need sketching and CAD.... The real world, though, is full of unfamiliar design targets, and schools have a responsibility to teach the difficult skill of taking on their perspectives. What students need to learn is not just empathy, but extreme empathy—the flexibility to inhabit the mind of someone dramatically unlike themselves.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 24, 2012 12:59 AM
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Jannet Ann Leggett
Founder: Charter for Compassion Canada
Canadians for Compassion The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves... It is also necessary in both public and private life to refrain consistently and empathically from inflicting pain.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 23, 2012 4:28 PM
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Eva-Maria Engelen and Birgitt Röttger-Rössler
Current Disciplinary and Interdisciplinary Debates on Empathy Isabel Dziobek: Comment: Towards a More Ecologically Valid Assessment of Empathy Arthur M. Jacobs: Comment on Walter’s “Social Cognitive Neuroscience of Empathy: Concepts, Circuits, and Genes” Henrik Walter: Author reply: Empathy and the Brain: How We Can Make Progress Nancy Eisenberg and Michael J. Sulik: Comment: Is Self–Other Overlap the Key to Understanding Empathy? India Morrison: Comment: A Trade-off between Broad and Specific Ideas of Neural Self–Other Overlap . . . . .
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 22, 2012 11:35 AM
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I started thinking about other books that evoke empathy -- A Long Walk to Water and Home of the Brave came to mind immediately because of recent conversations with colleagues about the power of these two books as read alouds in their fourth and fifth grade classrooms. And I decided to start a new shelf in Goodreads: Empathy. Here are the books I tagged (some are adult/YA): ....After spring break, I plan to ask my students to put their other reading aside and read from a collection of (age-appropriate for 4th graders) books I gather so that we can use literature to help us learn about, experience, have conversations about, and practice EMPATHY.
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 8:44 PM
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Artist: Georges de La Tour
Title: Kerze im Spiegel 'There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.' Edith Wharton http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_Wharton 'When I wish to find out how wise, or how stupid, or how good, or how wicked is any one, or what are his thoughts at the moment, I fashion the expression of my face, as accurately as possible, in accordance with the expression of his, and then wait to see what thoughts or sentiments arise in my mind or heart, as if to match or correspond with the expression. Edgar Allan Poe
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 3:02 PM
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'Andrew Whiten and Richard Byrne argue that primate intelligence stems from "Machiavellian Intelligence" -- the ability to manipulate and deceive others in the competition for scarce resources... The common thread running through all three traits is low empathy and low agreeableness. Still, the three traits are only moderately correlated with one another, and recently, researchers have started to assess the independent predictions of each separately from the others, and how people with a different balance of the dark triad traits go about obtaining their goals differently. In a hot-off-the press paper in Personality and Individual Differences, Michael Wai and Niko Tiliopoulos looked at the empathic nature of dark individuals. They distinguished between two types of empathy: cognitive empathy and affective empathy.' by Scott Barry Kaufman
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 2:01 PM
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Why not tell us more about a regular conservative agenda? Jon Ward has a typically smart report arguing that Rick Santorum is running on a compassionate conservatism 2.0. He writes: “Rick Santorum is trying to bring back a version of George W. Bush’s compassionate conservatism, with one major difference: very little talk of government programs. . . . His belief, he said, is that people will have to step up of their own free will and help others, sometimes through institutions like churches and charities, and sometimes on their own. The kicker? There’s little the government can do to make this take place.” There are a number of complications with this approach, quite aside from any suggestion that Santorum is in fact practicing “compassionate conservatism,” a phrase reviled by the right by the suggestion that regular conservatism lacks compassion. By Jennifer Rubin
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 1:39 PM
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New research shows there is a biological basis for co-operative and empathetic behaviour. "Darwin was much smarter than most of his followers," said de Waal, quoting from Darwin's The Descent of Man that animals that developed "well-marked social instincts would inevitably acquire a moral sense or conscience". De Waal showed the audience videos from laboratories revealing the dramatic emotional distress of a monkey denied a treat that another monkey received; and of a rat giving up chocolate in order to help another rat escape from a trap. Such research shows that animals naturally have pro-social tendencies for "reciprocity, fairness, empathy and consolation," said de Waal. "Human morality is unthinkable without empathy." More about Frans de Waal at
http://bit.ly/jn2OTe
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Scooped by
Edwin Rutsch
February 21, 2012 12:01 PM
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Morality emerges as a child begins to think about right and wrong, recognize with the feelings of others, and act in prosaically ways. While thinking, feeling, and acting are all aspects of morals, this article spotlights on feeling and ways caregivers can endorse the development of understanding in young children.
Empathy, Infants, and Toddlers
Empathy is essential to moral development since it allows us to recognize with the complete range of emotions experienced by others. The skill to empathize develops slowly and appears to be an essential precondition to acting in caring ways.
by lizzie milan img http://bit.ly/sw84GQ
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