Although definitions of empathy vary, the word is frequently defined as a vicarious emotional reaction based on the apprehension or comprehension of another’s emotional state or condition. Inherent in this definition is that this reaction is identical or very similar to what the other person is feeling or would be expected to feel in the situation. Indeed, empathy may often be the origin of other related emotional reactions. In many situations, for example, empathy is likely to turn into either sympathy or personal distress. Sympathy is an emotional reaction based on the apprehension of another’s emotional state or condition that involves feelings of compassion, sorrow, or concern for another person, rather than feeling merely the same emotion as the other individual. Sympathy is believed to involve an "other" orientation and the motivation to assist the other person, whereas empathy by itself does not. However, empathy may also turn into personal distress—an aversive, self-focused emotional reaction (such as anxiety or discomfort) to another’s emotional state or condition. Personal distress is associated with a focus on "self," with a desire to make the self, not the other person, feel better. Sympathy, on the other hand, tends to be related to other-oriented altruistic behavior, particularly when it is not easy to escape from the need or distress of the other person, or from social sanctions for not helping. Moreover, inducing adults to feel sympathy for a stigmatized group improves attitudes toward the group as a whole.
Empathy and sympathy appear to increase with age in childhood, but they may stabilize by mid- to late adolescence. Sympathy is not only related to engaging in prosocial behaviors such as helping and sharing, it is also correlated with high levels of social competence, low aggression in children, and measures of psychological adjustment. Females tend to score higher in sympathy and empathy than males, especially if the measure is self-reported or other-reported. Girls tend to display more concerned behaviors than boys, but there is no gender difference in males’ and females’ physiological reactions to empathy-inducing stimuli. Thus, males and females may respond similarly to empathy-inducing stimuli but interpret or react differently to them (Eisenberg and Fabes, 1998).
Empathy appears to have a biological basis. Identical twins, for example, tend to be more alike in empathy and sympathy than are fraternal twins. However, the familial and larger social environment appears to affect individual differences in empathy and sympathy. People tend to be more empathic or sympathetic if they are securely attached to their mother and if their parents are sympathetic, supportive, and warm in their parenting. In addition, parental expression of positive emotion in the family, parental discussion of emotion, and parental use of reasoning that emphasizes the effects of children’s behavior on others (and helps them to take the perspective of another) have been associated with the development of sympathy (and often empathy) in children. The expression of hostile negative emotions (e.g., anger) in the home has been associated with low levels of sympathy in children, but this association may not hold by adolescence.
Finally, because self-regulation is associated with being sympathetic, parenting practices that foster the regulation of emotion and behavior appear to promote the development of sympathy.
