Thesis PlanB (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Stout, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references.

There are several shortcomings in the empathy literature that have led to an incomplete understanding of this important social emotion. Specifically, definitions of the term lack consistency, and the majority treatment of empathy as a trait capacity has overshadowed our understanding of empathy as a state variable, and of the relationships between context-dependent cognitions and empathic responding. The purpose of this thesis is to present research into the resolution of these issues. A new conceptualisation of empathy was first developed, based upon a consideration of the published literature. The cognitive antecedents of empathy (agency, blame, perceived power, cognitive empathy, similarity, valuing, perceived need, morality, self-interest, and mood) were then identified and reviewed. As no scale existed to target these variables, a new scale was developed (the Cognitive Antecedents of Empathic Responding Scale [CAERS]). In Study 1 the face validity of the CAERS was established, and the internal reliability of the scale was improved in Study 2. In Study 3, participants‟ (n = 177) cognitions towards a high school bullying victim were measured, finding that that some antecedents (i.e., perceived need, valuing, cognitive empathy, similarity, self-interest, and morality) were more influential on empathic responding than others. The results of Study 4 showed that participants‟ (n = 83) cognitions (especially morality, valuing, agency, and blame) towards an individual depicted in a charity advertisement influenced how much empathy they felt for that target and how likely they were to donate to that charity. In Study 5, a one-trial prisoner‟s dilemma (n = 100) was used to demonstrate that self-interest is also an important factor to consider. A new model of the antecedents of empathic responding was developed from these results, which will serve as a useful starting point for those wishing to enhance the way we encourage empathy in others, especially those working in forensic, healthcare, and charitable contexts.

This dissertation, as its title suggests, is a study of gender and identification. The main body of the thesis is s consideration of four novels (Clarissa, The Scarlet Letter, Portrait of a Lady, and Tess of the d'Urbervilles), all of which are centered around a heroine defined by her suffering. In the figure of the heroine/victim is conjoined the activity of the hero and the passivity of the victim. Such a conjunction raises perplexing problems. One of these is that the "heroism" or "greatness" of the heroine is measured by means other than her action, for as victim she can do or move very little. Her heroism is measured instead by the pity and sympathy she elicits from other and by the extent to which she moves them (us). What this means for reading is that we cannot study the character without studying the response she generates. A study of character becomes a study of response - of both the responses represented in the text (those of other characters) and of our own response as readers. I read each of these four novels as a type of "school of sympathy," as a place in which readers are instructed how to feel. Novels, in this view, are social agents doing social work. Their work, in this case, is the construction of subjectivity. Each novel constructs the reader's emotions toward the heroine as much as it constructs the heroine herself. Gender plays an important part in this construction. Following some recent film as well as literary theory, I discuss to what extent the reader's position in these novels is constructed as male, and then go on to consider what implications this has for identification with the female. Each novel presents us with a type of cross-gender identification in which our sympathy for the heroine appears to depend upon the imposition of clear and distinct gender boundaries, boundaries which are established only to be crossed. In my sixth and final chapter, I turn to the work of two twentieth-century female authors, Margaret Atwood and Angela Carter, to see in what ways they "talk back" to the tradition which has defined woman as other, to see in what ways, if any, they re-define the possibility of female heroism, and, finally, to consider the implications for the reader. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

The purpose of this study was to examine the proposition that the accurate perception of the emotional state of another person would serve as an important determinant of the degree of the perceiver's physiological arousal and that this emotional arousal would serve to instigate an act designed to alleviate the distress of the other person. The subjects were asked to administer increasingly painful shocks to a performer who sat behind a screen. Two degrees of responsibility for inflicting pain and two different kinds of feedback of verbal cues of the performer's pain were combined in a 2X2 factorial design. In the Responsibility conditions either the subject or the experimenter took the responsibility for administering the aversive stimulation to the performer. In the Verbal conditions the performer either responded verbally at the moment of apparent shock or remained silent. The subjects, 40 volunteers, 20 males and 20 females, were randomly assigned to one of the four experimental conditions with the stipulation that each group contained a balanced number of males and females. During this experiment a Grass Polygraph provided a continuous record of the observing subjects' GSR reactivity. The subjects were also required to complete three of Davitz's test of emotional sensitivity (1964), Knowledge of Vocal Characteristics, Sensitivity to Vocal Stimuli, and the Metaphors Test. The main effects for Responsibility and Verbal conditions were analyzed in terms of their relationship to the experimental measures. The Combined Emotional Sensitivity score and the individual scores on the emotional sensitivity battery for all the subjects were correlated with the experimental measures. This procedure was repeated for each experimental group and for the verbalization trials alone. It was hypothesized that differences in emotional sensitivity, as measured by Davitz's test (1964), would be positively related to the number of sympathetic arousals, increases in the level of conductance, and negatively related to the number of shocks administered to the performer. Increased responsibility for administering the shock to the performer and the feedback of verbal pain cues hypothesized to be related to increases in the level of conductance throughout the whole experiment, to the number of changes in conductance at the time of the administration of the shock to the performer, and the magnitude of the changes in conductance at the time of the administration of the shocks to the performer. It was found that the Verbal condition was related to higher numbers of sympathetic arousals given at the time the shock was administered. This finding was related to S.Berger's (1962) findings and to the two phase model of sympathetic behavior suggested by Paskal and Aronfreed (l965). A significant relationship between the change in the level of conductance and the number of shocks administered was found. This suggested that the subject may have been aroused solely by being asked to witness the administration to aversive stimulation to the subject. However, cognitive-perceptual patterns of emotional sensitivity, as assessed with Davitz's measures, were not found to be related to the experimental measures of sympathetic behavior. It was suggested that these scores may have been determined by factors not necessarily related to the factors under consideration. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate

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Empathy is the ability to understand another person's subjective condition, including emotions. Depending on culture, emotions are expressed differently, hence there might occur difficulties for one person to understand emotions in another if they belong to different cultures. This study explores how depression is described in western psychiatry, compared to alternative cultural forms of similar conditions. Building on how the understanding of the client's emotions is shaped in the psychiatric meeting, the limit of empathy is discussed as well as what might influence the understanding of another person's emotions. Two limits of empathy are revealed, both depending on differences in the individuals relation to the surrounding world. The first limit is found in differences between emotions, the second limit is related to differences in experience due to when they are based in either emotional or cognitive conceptions. The conclusion of this study is that the scientific thinking and the cognitively based understanding of emotions changes the comprehension of them – from being interpreted as a way to relate to the world to being interpreted more as characteristics within the individual. Consequently, the possibility to empathetically understand the other's emotions diminishes.

The accurate assessment of psychopathy constitutes a critical component of forensic assessments addressing offender populations. Among the core characteristics of psychopathy, the interpersonal component of deception and empathic deficits are prominently observed in offenders with psychopathic traits. Given the negative consequences of being classified as a psychopath, offenders may be likely to minimize their psychopathic traits. In particular, no research has investigated whether offenders with psychopathic traits are able to simulate empathy in an effort to mask their cognitive or affective empathy deficits (e.g., lack of remorse about offenses). The present study aims to contribute to the literature with regard to the simulation of empathy. Using a mixed between- and within-subjects design, 81 male detainees were placed into (a) a low psychopathy group, (b) a moderate psychopathy group, or (c) a high psychopathy group based on the Psychopathy Checklist – Revised. For the within-subjects component, all offenders answered empathy questionnaires under genuine and simulation conditions. Results indicate the sample possessed cognitive empathy, but did not display affective empathy under genuine instructions. Under simulation instructions, participants significantly increased their scores on several empathy measures. The implications of simulated empathy and comparisons between groups regarding simulation abilities are discussed.

Call number: LD2668 .T4 1956 S65 / Master of Science