PSYC2013 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Personal Distress, Electrodermal Activity, Prosocial Behavior
27 Dec 2018
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What is it? - eisenberg & strayer (1987); eisenberg (2000) An affective response that stems from the apprehension or comprehension of another"s emotional state or condition, and that is identical or very similar to what the other person is feeling or would be expected to feel. To feel empathy requires at least some differentiation of one"s own and another"s emotional state or condition. To be contrasted with emotion contagion; which doesn"t involve differentiation. Ex: you fail, your friend passes - you feel happy seeing your friend happy with their mark. Sympathy : an affective response that consists of feeling sorrow or concern for the distressed or needy other (not merely the same emotional response as in empathy or emotion contagion) Involves other-oriented altruistic motivations and probably originates with empathic responding in many situations. You pass, your friend fails - you feel sad seeing your friend unhappy. Empathy can be positive or negative emotions, sympathy is a response to negative emotions.
