Evolutionary accounts of empathy often focus on the ways in which empathy-motivated helping can give rise to indirect fitness benefits. These accounts posit that empathy is adaptive insofar as it motivates strategic helping behavior, but they neglect a key feature of the empathic process – it can prepare one to act effectively within a shared environment. In particular, adopting the affective and motivational states of others provides a rapid and automatic way to avoid danger and threat, which play a disproportionately large role in shaping behavior. Based on the idea that empathic processes facilitate adaptive reactions to threat, I conducted four experiments to test the hypothesis that empathic reactions reflect withdrawal motivation. In the first experiment I used electroencephalography (EEG) to measure baseline right-frontal cortical asymmetry, a reliable neural correlate of withdrawal motivation. I then assessed empathic reactions to images of children ostensibly taken from a charity campaign. Participants who showed greater right-frontal cortical asymmetry also showed stronger empathic reactions to the images. In the second study I used self-report measures fear and anger to assess dispositional withdrawal- and approach-motivation, respectively. This time, participants indicated their empathic reactions to targets experiencing happiness and targets experiencing sadness. Empathy for both types of targets was positively related to fear and negatively related to physical aggression, again supporting a link between empathy and withdrawal motivation. In the third study I measured state withdrawal motivation by using facial electromyography (EMG) to assess disgust expressions towards charity images. These expressions were positively correlated with empathic reactions, demonstrating that state withdrawal motivation is also positively related to empathy. In the final study I manipulated approach and withdrawal emotions by having participants make emotional facial expressions. Focusing on fear and anger, I found that participants were more empathic when making fearful faces than when making angry faces, although these results must be interpreted with caution, as the manipulation may not have had the intended effects on emotional state. Taken together, these four studies provide converging evidence of an association between withdrawal motivation and empathy, supporting the idea that empathy plays a role in the adaptive response to threat.

Tidigare forskning har visat att kvinnor uppsöker professionell hjälp oftare än män, detta sägs bero på att kvinnor har lättare att erkänna sig själva som svaga. Syftet var att undersöka om det fanns någon skillnad i hur män och kvinnor bedömde en kollegas arbetsrelaterade stress samt om kollegans kön påverkade bedömningen. Ett urval på 108 yrkesarbetande män och kvinnor från två sektorer valdes ut, deltagarna läste tre vinjetter om en stressad man eller kvinna vars hälsa gradvis försämras på grund av ökad arbetsbelastning. En flervägs mixed ANOVA gjordes med bedömningen av målpersonens arbetsbörda, ohälsa och hjälpbehov som beroendevariabler. Resultaten visade att män uppfattade en kvinnlig kollegas ohälsa och hjälpbehov som större än en manlig kollegas. Kvinnor gjorde ingen skillnad på manliga eller kvinnliga kollegor. Män och kvinnor uppfattade det motsatta könets arbetsbörda som större än det egna. Kvinnliga eller manliga kollegor kan vara avgörande för när individen blir erbjuden hjälp.

Det finns stereotyper om kvinnor med olika hårfärg och stereotyper påverkar människors empati och bedömning. Därför gjordes ett kvasiexperiment där det undersöktes om en kvinnlig brottsling väcker olika mycket empati beroende på (a) vilken hårfärg hon har och (b) empatisörens kön. I studien deltog 132 personer, varav 61 kvinnor och designen var en enkät där experimentgruppen fick läsa om en gärningskvinna som antingen var blond, brunhårig, svarthårig eller rödhårig och därefter skatta empati utifrån Batsons empatiskala. Resultaten visade att (a) blondiner väcker minst empati medan rödhåriga väcker mest (b) kvinnor  känner högre empati än män och (c) empati stiger med åldern. Dessa resultat förklarades bland annat med att blondiner mer än rödhåriga ses som objekt i samhället och är därför mindre empativäckande, att kvinnor i högre grad än män förväntas vara empatiska då det är detta beteende som förväntas av kvinnorollen samt att empati är något som utvecklas med tiden.

In the current literature base of social-emotional development in early childhood there exists a paucity of research of empathy development due to the complicated nature of empathy in young children. The present study utilizes a preexisting dataset from a local therapeutic preschool program, and its methods include visual analysis, correlations, and independent samples t-tests. Results of the present study found that clinical behavior patterns negatively correlate with empathy development. Further, statistically significant group differences exist in affective empathy for children whose parents have a mental health diagnosis. However, results regarding adaptive skills were not found to be statistically significant. The present study contributes and expands the current literature base by exploring empathy development among a clinical sample of preschool-age children. The present study is also unique in its incorporation of specific family factors. / School of Education; / School Psychology / PhD; / Dissertation;

Past research has demonstrated that empathy can reduce prejudicial attitudes as it leads people to share a sense of common identity with other cultural groups (Stephan & Finlay, 1999) or by arousing feelings of injustice (Finlay & Stephan, 2000). However, the current volume of research largely centers around administering empathy-inducing scenarios to participants and then assessing levels of prejudicial attitudes as opposed to examining initial levels of empathy. In addition, there is a lack of research regarding modern prejudicial attitudes towards individuals of Aboriginal descent. The present study examines the predictive value of ethnocultural empathy, age, gender, and social desirability on the levels of those prejudicial attitudes. One hundred and sixty eight undergraduate students from the University of Saskatchewan completed a questionnaire, including the Scale of Ethnocultural Empathy (Wang, Davidson, Yakushko, Savoy, Tan, & Bleier, 2003), the Prejudiced Attitudes Towards Aboriginals Scale (Morrison, 2007), and Form C of the Marlowe Crowne Social Desirability Scale (Reynolds, 1982). <p>The multiple regression analysis revealed that ethnocultural empathy and age were predictive of modern prejudicial attitudes toward Aboriginals. Participants with higher levels of ethnocultural empathy reported reduced levels of modern prejudicial attitudes. However, contrary to expectation, gender was not a significant predictor variable. Practical applications and limitations of these findings are discussed as well as directions for future research.

Att spela tv- och datorspel är idag en stor del av många människors liv. Ioch med en förfinad teknik hos spelen, med bättre spelmiljö och artificiellintelligens skapas det en större realism och funderingar kan uppstå hur dettakan påverka en utövare. Den här undersökningen testade sambandet mellanempati och graden av våldsamhet i spelen hos en utövare. Det var 64gymnasieelever som deltog i en enkätundersökning, varav 16 var män. Föratt mäta empati användes Davis-IRI. Samtliga studerade vid ettsamhällsvetenskapligt program. Resultatet visade att män spelade mer, ochvåldsammare spel än kvinnor. Personer som spelade var mindre ängsliga ändem som inte spelade. Minst ängsliga var de som spelade våldsammast spel.Däremot hade de som spelade mindre våldsamma spel mer empatiskomtanke och perspektivtagande. Empatin var alltså lägre hos de somspelade våldsammare spel. Det kan dock ej fastställas om empatinivåernaberor på spelen eller utövaren.

Kvinnor har visats vara mer empatiska än män vid självskattning samt att vita och svarta barn känner mer empati för en målperson med samma hudfärg. Denna studies syfte var att undersöka om män och kvinnor kände olika mycket empati beroende på målpersonens etni-citet, om det fanns några könsskillnader i empati samt om något av könen väckte mer empati. Deltagarna var 208 män och kvinnor med svensk och invandrarbakgrund, majoriteten studerade på Mälardalens högskola. Resultatet visade en signifikant disordinal interaktion där svenska deltagare visade högre empati för en svensk målperson än vad de gjorde för en invandrad och invandrardeltagare visade högre empati för en invandrad målperson än vad de gjorde för en svensk. Ingen huvudeffekt för empati och deltagarnas etnicitet fanns. Män uppvisade signifikant lägre empati än kvinnor. Inget av könen väckte signifikant mer empati. Vikten av upplevd likhet mellan målperson och empatisör diskuterades och vidare forskning med äldre deltagare föreslogs.

The working alliance has received consistent empirical support relating the construct to psychotherapy outcome. There is no empirical research on any particular techniques that may prove useful at increasing the level of working alliance. In this study, the therapeutic compliment is defined, discussed, and compared with other therapeutic interventions to find its usefulness in therapy and its ability to impact the working alliance. 120 African-Americans from a large southwestern university and a medium southeastern university participated in this study by viewing one of six mock therapy sessions that had one of three different interventions: Therapeutic Compliment, Simple Compliment, and Advanced Accurate Empathy. The mock sessions were created to provide two levels of session relationship (high and low). The participants completed three measures, the Working Alliance Inventory, Hopefulness Scale, and Accurate Empathy Scale, to determine the perceptions of the different interventions. The study utilized multiple analyses of variances (ANOVAs) to compare the means of the three interventions.Statistical significance was not found with overall general working alliance scores from the Working Alliance Inventory (WAI). The individual subscales of the WAI, goals, tasks, and bonds, however; did reveal significance when comparing the interventions across one level of the session relationship (high). The interventions were not statistically different from each other in terms of perceived hopefulness and empathy. No significance was found when comparing the interventions with perceived hopefulness of outcome or level of perceived empathy. The implications from this study include a first look at the use of complimenting in therapy and a first attempt to analyze a specific technique to create an influence on the working alliance. Further research is still needed to understand which techniques are more beneficial at creating an affect on the working alliance.

This thesis explores participatory design methods and presents the process and the outcomes of a related case study, carried out in collaboration with Vestel Electronics, a Turkish consumer electronics manufacturer, on TV remote controls. The thesis comprises a literature review on participatory design, including its historical background and evolution, the motivations behind its contemporary utilization and the methods, techniques and tools utilized within the approach. The case study comprises two phases. In the first phase, a participatory user workshop was realized with eight middle-aged Turkish housewives. In the second phase, an interactive, computer based design resource was developed by the author, which aims to present the workshop outcomes to designers. The resource was evaluated by the designers of Vestel Electronics and the outcomes are presented in the thesis. Through such a case study the approach of a Turkish in-house design team towards participatory design methods was reached. Moreover, insights about how such a design resource can be developed were gained through designers&amp / #8217 / evaluations.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Drexel University, 2002. / Includes abstract and vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-132).