psychological study of empathy
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Journal of Phenomenological Psychology 43 (2012)151184 brill.com/jpp
pheno
menol
ogicalpsych
ology
jour
nalof
Edith Stein and the Contemporary Psychological
Study of Empathy
Rita W. MenesesCatolica-Lisbon School of Business and Economics,
Universidade Catlica Portuguesa, Lisbon, Portugal
Michael LarkinSchool of Psychology, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK
Abstract
Illuminated by the writings of Edith Stein (1917/1989), this paper presents a model
of empathy as a very particular intersubjective understanding. This is commonly a
view absent from psychology literature. For Stein, empathy is the experience of
experientially and directly knowing another persons experience, as it unfolds in
the present, together with the awareness of the otherness of that experience. It
can be conceptually distinguished, in terms of process and experience, from
current models that propose that empathic understandings are intellectual expe-
riences (e.g., explicit simulation theories, perspective-taking) or sympathetic expe-
riences (e.g., implicit simulation theories, contagion-related theories). As such,
she provides an additional or alternative aspect to understanding other peoples
experiences. Our paper provides a summary of Steins key analytic claims about
three key facets of empathy (directly perceiving, experientially projecting, and
interpretatively mentalizing). Her views are discussed in the light of debates rele-
vant for contemporary psychology and social cognition.
Keywords
empathy, social understandings, sympathy, intersubjectivity
Empathy entered everyday discourse surprisingly recently. The German
philosopher Theodor Lipps was inuential in this. In 1903, Lipps adopted
This is a common contemporary historical view, although Duan and Hill (1994, p. 261)
were able to track down the use ofEinfhlungto Robert Vischer (1873), in the aesthetic eld,
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the German termEinfhlung, derived from the Greek empatheia(fromem-
in and pathosfeeling), in his thesis on aesthetic experiences. This con-
ceptwas translated by Titchener into English as empathy. It was used todescribe the process of humanizing objects, of reading or feeling ourselves
into them (Titchener, 1924, p. 417, cf. Duan & Hill, 1996, p. 261). At the core
of this concept is the idea of going into a strong feeling-connection with
another (Barrett-Lennard, 1981, p. 91).
Soon after this, Max Schelers (1913/1979) work on sympathy appeared,
(Sympathie/mitgefhl), followed by Edith Steins thesis on empathy
(1917/1989). Lipps, Scheler and Stein proposed theoretically distinct views
of these interpersonal phenomena (sympathy and empathy), which, overtime, have been confused with one another. Among Scheler, Lipps and
Stein, there is, however, an agreement that empathy is a way of knowing or
understanding others: there are three spheres of knowledge. I know about
things, about myself, and about others. . . . The source of the third type of
knowledge is empathy (Barrett-Lennard, 1981, p. 91, cf. Allport, 1937, p. 351).
This was the core consensual meaning of empathy in philosophy in the
beginning of the twentieth century.
Aims
Presently, the stance that empathy is a way of knowing or understanding
others sometimes appears to be a non-consensual position, although it is
the one adopted in this paper. For example, in psychology, empathy can be
regarded as a responsive sympathetic feeling, also named empathic con-
cern (i.e., an other-oriented emotional response elicited by and congruent
with the perceived welfare of someone else, Batson, 2009, p. 8).
Among those who have psychologically investigated interpersonal
understandings, some have proposed that these come about via an explicit
which would be the predecessor of empathy, to mean humans spontaneous projection of real
psychic feeling into the people and things they perceive. On the other hand, Zepf and Hart-
mann (2008, p. 56) remarked that the word empathy was rst used by Lotze, in 1858, to
describe how we can deploy our imagination to place ourselves in, and participate in the expe-
rience of nature, as well as to Herder, in 1774, to describe how one feels oneself into every-
thing. Therefore, although there are alternative historical versions, in these early beginnings,
empathy was a term that described an act that connected a subject to an object (person or
other) by means of which some sort of knowing of that object occurred.
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simulation process, that is, a higher-order intellectual process of adopting
someone elses perspective (intellectual understandings); and some more
suggested that social understandings are the result of an implicit simulationprocessthat involves ones personal emotional responses to other peoples
experiences (sympathetic understandings).
In this paper, we suggest that these two models capture two distinctive
routes to understanding other peoples experiences; and that there is an
additional form of understanding (intuitive understandings). It has also
been proposed as an alternative route in phenomenology (e.g., Gallagher,
2007). Although this particular form of understanding appears to underlie
some psychotherapy approaches (e.g., Rogers, 1957/2007), psychologicalmodels do not usually address this type of understanding as a phenomenon
on its own right (e.g., Kerem, Fishman & Josselson, 2001).
The experience of an intuitive understanding was thoroughly described
by Edith Stein. Her thesis, On the problem of empathy (1917/1989; Zum
Problem der Einfhlung), was conducted under the supervision of Edmund
Husserl. It is a rare, canonical example of orthodox, Husserlian, phenome-
nological inquiry. In this work, Stein provides one of the most systematic,
complete, and thorough applications of Husserls methodological approach
to experience. It is also a text which offfers a remarkably contemporary,
theoretically coherent, and clear delineation of the psychological phenom-
enon of empathy, as it appears in consciousness.
Steins clarity about the limits and nature of empathy was achieved by
means of the phenomenological method. This required her to establish the
essential features of empathy, and to rule out of her account those simula-
cra of empathy which, without close examination, might be mistaken for
empathy itself. Given that the eld of empathy studies is in some concep-
tual disarray (e.g. see Batson, 2009), and that the term itself has a relativelyrecent history, Steins conceptual clarity is worthy of re-discovery and offfers
a sound basis for further psychological research. Unfortunately, the con-
ceptual clarity of her thinking is not mirrored by theaccessibility of her
workthe text of her thesis on empathy is embedded within the dense and
specialist phrasing of the German phenomenologists. In this article, we hope
to unpack Steins ideas for a contemporary psychological audience. We
hope to persuade those interested in the nature of empathy, that through
its study as a lived experience, a theoretically and coherently grounded
understanding of this particular form of understanding can be generated.
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Steins work on empathy has been overlooked by much contemporary
psychologyin contrast with Lipps and Schelers theses on the theme. As
we shall see, her work is also sometimes misinterpreted, or only partiallyportrayed. Recently, however, there has been a growing resurgence of inter-
est in some of her doctoral claims, both in the phenomenological and
psychological elds of research (e.g., Barrett-Lennard, 1981; Boulanger &
Lanon, 2006; Depraz, 2008, 2001; Gallagher, 2007; Gurmin, 2007; Prinz,
2006; Reik, 1948/1971; Rockwell, 2007; Rogers, 1957/2007; Thompson, 2001;
White, 1997; Zahavi, 2008, 2007, 2001).
We think that her ideas have the potential to clarify the concept of empa-
thy for psychology, and to open up new directions for researchers in thiseld. We will therefore focus upon the key aspects of Steins thesis, drawing
out those which have most relevance for the psychology of empathy. Steins
views sometimes contradict widely-held contemporary views about empa-
thy, but they are developed with a logic and elegance which is persuasive,
and we hope that the reader will nd these points of diffference illuminat-
ing and informative; and that a particular picture of empathy emerges.
Steins Brief Biography
Edith Stein (18911942) was born at Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany, into a
Jewish family. In her youth, she declared herself an atheist. Stein began her
doctoral work while working as an assistant to Husserl at the University of
Gttingen, but her studies were interrupted by the war, and the death of
Husserls son. For a period she worked as a nurse at a eld hospital in Aus-
tria. In 1916, the eld hospital was dissolved, and Husserl took up a new post
at Freiburg im Breisgau, so Stein returned to the town of her birth, where
she completed her doctorate in 1917. Stein worked alongside Martin Heide-
gger, who was also an assistant to Husserl during this period. In Germany,
professorial posts were not easily obtained by women or Jews at this time;
and Stein appears to have struggled to nd a niche for herself. She held
posts at Freiburg and Gttingen, before working as a schoolteacher for
some years. Academically, she retained an interest in phenomenology, phi-
losophy and psychology, but in the 1920s she also converted to Catholicism,
and an increasingly theological focus informed her later work. She left her
For a biography, see Oben (1988/2010), and Macintyre (2006).
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Gallagher, 2007; Gurmin, 2007; Hart, 1999; Prinz, 2006; Scheler, 1913; Stein,
1917; Thompson, 2001; Zahavi, 2008, 2007, 2001), andprojection theories(under-
standing via a identication-related projected experience; e.g., Bachelor, 1988;Boulanger & Lanon, 2006; Gladstein, 1983; Hkansson & Montgomery,
2003; Kerem et al., 2001; Tempel, 2007; Zepf & Hartmann, 2008).
Explicit simulation(perspective-taking, role-taking, theories of mind) is
a higher-order, usually deliberated reasoning about available information
or cues (Batson, 2009, p. 4), based on the others experience or situation,
such as what she says and does and your knowledge of her character, values,
and desires (Batson, 2009, p. 7). Here, one intellectually imagines, predicts
or simulates another persons experience. For example, if a friend tells youthat he is going to father a child, and you knew that he had been trying to
have children for a while, you now imagine that he is happy. This is how
explicit simulation works; and hence it can be said that it is an intellectual
form of understandingothers.
Implicit simulationtheories see social understandings as the result of a
contamination and/or mimicking experience and a lower-order imagina-
tive experience. That is, people have the the tendency to automatically
mimic and synchronize facial expressions, vocalizations, postures and move-
ments with those of another person, and, consequently, to converge emotion-
ally (Hateld et al., 2009 p. 19). This reaction is subsequentlyused as the
source of knowledge of the experience of another, in a stepwise manner
(rst mimicry, then contagion, and then understanding). Thus, one infers
from ones afffective reaction the experience of another. For example, you
encounter a friend, feel unexpectedly happy, and you may somewhere
along the line conclude that it is your friend that is happy after all. This is
consistent with Lipps theory, and with the contemporary model of inter-
personal understandings provided by neurocognitive theories. Projectionofffers a similar reading of events but via a distinctive terminology (through
the concepts of identication, and then projection; e.g., Zepf & Hartmann,
2008); and without determining that the reactive emotional experience
(and perhaps the projective experience as well) necessarilyhappens sub-
consciously, as generally observed with implicit simulation theories.
Lipps would argue that this experience amounts to an empathic form of
interpersonal understanding. Scheler would counter-argue by suggesting
that contamination and identication are examples of sympathetic phe-
nomena; and that sympathy is to be distinguished from empathy. Certainly,
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sympathy is rst and foremost a response to anothers experience, although
it sometimes leaves the impression that one understands others too: we
seem to have an immediate understanding of anothers experiences, whilealso participating in them (Scheler, 1913, p. 3). For Scheler, these respon-
sive afffective phenomena should better be called sympathynot empa-
thy. We propose that the interpersonal understanding achieved through
sympathy should perhaps be conceptualized as a sympathetic form of
understanding, and one which should be distinguished, on the one hand,
from the intellectual form of understanding described by explicit simula-
tion theories.
Stein would not accept any of the above explanations as illustrative ofthe phenomenon of empathy. Her position is in accordance with current
phenomenological theories. From this phenomenological perspective, we
can use our minds and experiences to personally simulate (explicitly or
implicitly) anothers experience, in order to gain insight about these, but
this is not the only, or most ordinary way, of understanding others. That is,
most commonly, from the viewpoint of the lived experience, one does not
need to react in any emotional (contagion), behavioural (mimicking) or
rational (remembering our knowledge or similar past experiences) way for
the understanding to come about.
Rather, people can understand one another not by inference, but directly,
as a sort of primary perception (Scheler, 1913, p. 10). This ability is present
from infancy, when already in a non-mentalizing way, I am able to see
meaning, intention, and emotions in the actions of others (Gallagher, 2007,
p. 354). For example, you look at your friend and just see how happy he is,
while disclosing the news to you. That is, you would have a perceptive kind
of understanding of his experiencefor claritys sake, say, an intuitive form
of understanding. In broad strokes, this is what empathy is, for Stein. Thisexperience is sometimes described as an experiential understanding,
anchored in the having of the experience of another, and thus confused
with sympathetic understandings.
We here propose that these explanations for interpersonal understand-
ings (intellectual, sympathetic and intuitive) are distinctive psychological
experiences, and merit to be explained in the light of appropriate psycho-
logical theories. By offfering Steins views to a contemporary readership, we
offfer to discussion an alternative (intuitive) form of interpersonal under-
standing that is often absent from psychology literature.
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Empathy and Sympathy: A Distinction
According to a useful distinction made by Batson (2009), we can place Steinalongside those researchers who understand empathy as a way of knowing
what another person is experiencing, and in opposition to those for whom
empathy is a response to that knowledge. For instance, many psychologists
would hold that empathys afffective component consists of a personal
emotional response, congruent with the afffective state of another person
(e.g., Batson, 2009; Boulanger & Lanon, 2006; Decety & Jackson, 2006,
2004; Depraz, 2001; Duan & Hill, 1996; Eisenberg, 2000; Gladstein, 1983;
Hkansson, 2003; Hofffman, 2000; Hassenstab et al., 2007; Hateld et al.,
2009; Jabbi et al., 2007; Kerem et al., 2001; Preston & Waal, 2002). Two formsof afffective responses commonly investigated by these authors are conta-
gion and distress; and their importance in current empathy-related litera-
ture is evident in the following: all forms of empathy involve some level of
emotional contagion and personal distress (Preston & Waal, 2002, p. 4).
Stein explicitly rejects this idea, not because these responses do not
exist, but because, for her, it is not the response, in itself, that is empathic.
For Stein, empathy is, by denition, a means through which knowledge
is acquired about another persons experienceand not a reaction orresponse to that understanding. As Zahavi says, empathy (. . .)amounts to
experiencing, say, the other persons emotion without being in the correspond-
ing emotional state yourself (2008, p. 517). Contagion and distress are ruled
out as mere simulacra of empathy, precisely because these arepersonaland
responsiveexperiencesnotanothers experience.
An Example
In neurocognitive psychology, mirror neuron activation is often read as acontamination or contagion response. According to Scheler (1913), conta-
gion is a discrete, personal, reactive phenomenon that does not presuppose
any sort of knowledge of the joy which others feel (p. 15), sometimes happen-
ing subconsciously, beyond awareness, in the sense that we get into these
states without realizing that this is how this comes about (Scheler, 1913,
pp. 16/17). Furthermore, during contagion, there is nothing in the mournful
feeling itself to point to its origin; only by inference from causal consideration
does it become clear where it came from. That is, contagion can only become
a form of interpersonal understanding if one infers from ones personal
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reaction that the other person is probably having a similar experience (i.e.,
projects the contaminated experience onto the empathee), as implicit sim-
ulation theories propose.Contagion researchers commonly back up their empathy theories with
cross-species studies of emotional contagion, social imitation, and the work
of audiovisuomotor neurons/mirror neurons (van Baaren et al., 2009; Bou-
langer & Lanon, 2006; Decety & Jackson, 2006, 2004; Dinstein, Thomas,
Behrmann & Heeger, 2008; Gallese, 2003; Goldman, 2006; Hateld et al.,
2009; Preston & Waal, 2002). In short, researchers experimenting on
macaque monkeys have found that some neurons are active both when
performing a goal-directed action, and when observing it being performedby another monkey or person. They called these mirror, or audiovisuomo-
tor, neurons. The activation of these neurons is hypothesised to underpin a
form of social understanding (implicit simulation theories). This illustrates
the contamination-as-knowing hypothesis that we have suggested as an
example of a sympathetic understanding.
On the other hand, in phenomenologically-informed research areas,
the neurobiological and behavioural evidence is often interpreted in a
coupling-as-knowingsense (Depraz, 2008, 2001; Gallagher, 2007; Thompson,
2001). The diffference between the neurocognitive contamination-as-knowing
interpretation and the neurophenomenological coupling-as-knowingreading
of the (sometimes same) evidence is irreconcilable; they cannot both be
accepted to explain the same evidence. One excludes the other.
The term coupling originated from Humberto Maturanas biological
research (1975) on autopoiesis (theoretical description of the inter-
relationships between living beings and the environment), currently most
often associated with his student, Francisco Varela and his neurophenom-
enological approach to psychology. Coupling is a self-other linkage occur-ring at a biological cellular level. It is a pre-reexive, permanently dynamic
and co-generative self-other link. For him, both environment and organ-
isms are said to be constantly changing and co-determining each other,
even at a cellular level. This theory is sometimes criticized for its solipsism,
though given the intrinsic intersubjective meaning of coupling, this criti-
cism is perhaps a misinterpretation. Claiming that the observer and
Steins approach is phenomenological and descriptivenot explanatory. She does not
address the whys, the genesis or psychological mechanisms behind the experience of empa-
thy. For these, we must turn elsewhere.
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observed change one another at such a primordial level of analysis is not an
elegy to solipsism, it is not a defence that the world is nothing but a subjec-
tivity inside ones mind.Rather, it is accepting that the world is intersubjectively constructed, in
the more Heideggerian sense of being-in-the-world. This view does not
obliterate or clash with the premise that there is a world out there to be
perceived and experienced. Subject and object are still two diffferent enti-
ties, despite their mutual inuences upon each other. Coupling is not merg-
ing, or a dissolution of self and other identities as some tend to suggest (e.g.,
Finlay, 2005). It is simply an interaction occurring at a biological level. Gal-
lagher (2007, p. 356) gives a good example of this coupling mechanism:
If we think of perception as an enactive process (e.g., Hurley, 1998; No,
2004)as involving sensory-motor skills, rather than as just sensory input/
processing; as an active, skilful, embodied engagement with the world rather
than the passive reception of information from the environmentthen it
may be more appropriate to think of the resonance processes as part of the
structure of the perceptual process when perception is of the action of conspe-
cics. Fogassi and Gallese, despite their simulationist interpretation, put this
point clearly: perception, far from being just the nal outcome of sensory inte-gration, is the result of sensorimotor coupling (2002, p. 27). Mirror activation,
on this interpretation, is not the initiation of simulation, it is part of a direct
intersubjective perception of what the other is doing.
Gallagher does not dissociate the mirror neuron activation from empathic
experiences; he reads it as a sign of the phenomenon of coupling; and asso-
ciates it with the meaning of direct perception. For instance, you are seeing
your friends happiness, rather than feeling happy yourself, while listening
to the news. This illustrates the coupling-as-knowing interpretation.Through coupling, the empathizers experience is composed of 1) a percep-
tive side; 2) a self-felt resonant personal side (inclusively, mirror neuron
activation). For him, mirror neuron activation is part of the empathic per-
ceptive act; but it is not a contamination emotional reaction as this phe-
nomenon is dened. Rather, it is a response insofar as a perception can be
conceptualized as a response (to the existence of an object in the environ-
ment). This is a radically diffferent interpretation of the mirror neuron acti-
vation; and one which does not involve an inferential act, nor an emotionalcontagion reaction, for the understanding to happen, as with the contami-
k Th
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theories are illustrated in Figure 10. Coupling-as-knowing(intersubjective
empathic direct understanding experience) is not to be confused with
the contamination-as-knowingtheory (a personal response, an experiencewhich is no longer, or never was, anothers, and that is subsequently taken
for anothers via an additional act).
From the typical neurocognitive viewpoint, empathic understandings
are a step-by-step experience with each step (the cells identied in the
Neurocognitive Perspective: contamination-as-knowing column) follow-
ing upon the contamination and/or mimicry response. This means that
peoples social understandings are seen are the result of a prior sympathetic
(Scheler, 1913) response; they are always purely subjective experiencesderived from a personal afffective reaction.
Figure 1: Comparison between the neurocognitive and the neuro-
h l l l f h k
Neurocognitive perspective:
contamination-as-knowing
Foreign experience
Perception of external cues
Imitation and contagion-as-
contamination responses
Simulation of an experience
Self-other diffferentiation
Inferential knowledge of the
foreign experience
Neurophenomenological
perspective:
coupling-as-knowing
Foreign experience
Direct awareness of the foreign
experience via an intersubjective
coupling experience (perceiving
and contagion-as-coupling)
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On the other hand, neurophenomenology proposes that empathy is a
direct, experiential, non-mediated, intersubjective understandingthat is
not ttingly conceived as a plain afffective sympathetic response, nor anintellectual or inferential or projective knowing. It is rather an intersubjec-
tive experience, in terms of process andin terms of experiential qualities.
Empathy is to experience anothers experience at once, and know that it is
anothers experience, simultaneously, as part of the same act. This is con-
gruent with Steins position.
Empathy as an Intersubjective Process
To introduce what Stein means by empathy, we will begin by clarifying theepistemological assumptions behind her reasoning, which are drawn from
the rst phases of Husserls phenomenology (Gurmin, 2007; Macintyre,
2006/2007).
The rst of these is that people are embodied and minded, and embed-
ded in the world. Secondly, the world is objectively out there to be per-
ceived, in the sense that it is not merely a subjective representation inside
the mind. Thirdly, people relate to the world by means of an intentional
act of consciousness. This intentional act is what brings the world andits objects into consciousness, as phenomena. Consciousness is always
intentionalit connects a self to an object, in consciousnessand it is
always relationalin the sense that it places a self and an object in relation
to one another, by means of an intentional act. Fourthly, phenomena bear
in themselves essential qualities of the given world (object). Finally, it is
held that through phenomenology it is possible to inspect these phenom-
ena and identify the worlds essential qualities.
For Stein (p. 6; p. 21), empathy is an intentional act in this phenomeno-
logical sense. However, it is a very particular kind of intentional act, because
its object is the experience of another. It is generally a core assumption that
empathy is about our experience of another. This is referred to in the litera-
ture as the alterity, othernessorforeignquality of an experience. For Stein,
empathy deals with the givenness, to oneself, of this foreign experience;
and it is through empathy that foreign experience is comprehended ( p. 6).
Steins understanding of empathy difffers from some contemporary deni-
tions because she explicitly denes empathy as a way of knowing, rather
than as a response to the foreign experience (after Batson, 2009), andin terms of her description of the way this knowledge comes about. In
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particular, for her, empathy is a direct givenness, as opposed to the indi-
rect inference (sympathetic and intellectual understandings) favoured by
some authors.Steins conception of empathy always involves at least two perspectives,
self and other. Thus, psychologically speaking, empathy can be said to
be an interpersonal process (and intersubjective in the phenomenological
sense outlined above). There is always the empathizer, relating to the
empathized (even given the case of empathizing with oneself ).
On the other hand, in the models of empathy proposed by her predeces-
sor, Lipps, and in implicit simulation theories, a kind of merging of empa-
thizer and empathized is hypothesisedone during which self and otherbecome one.
Stein rejects the idea that empathy is the experience of oneness with
another. For Stein, Lipps view of empathy describes a kind of inner par-
ticipation in others experiences (p. 12), which is only complete when there
is no longer a distinction between oneself and the other. For Lipps, the ulti-
mate level of empathy is a unity between self and other, captured by a feel-
ing of oneness (p. 16). Lipps explains this with a theory of imitation, which
resonates with contemporary ideas about contagion and mirroring (e.g.
Hateld et al., 2009), but is distinct from empathy as Stein understands it.
Perhaps as a consequence of Lipps work, we nd a number of recent
authors asserting that empathy is, or involves, a lack of self-other distinc-
tion (Preston & Waal, 2002, p. 4, tab. 2), or a total identication without
discrimination between ones feelings and those of the other (Decety &
Jackson, 2004, p. 75); or a merging-with, where subject and object function
as an unique body (Finlay, 2005); or a feeling of at-oneness (Davis, C., 1990,
p. 709), or a connection that temporarily unites the separate social entities
of self and other (Davis, M., 2009).For Stein, empathy is not the feeling of oneness (p. 17). Empathy as this
oneness, entanglement (Decety & Jackson, 2006, p. 56), fusion, or confu-
sion, is, for Stein, an impossible position, simply because what my body is
doing to my body and the foreign body is doing to the foreign body would then
remain completely obscure (p. 16). We would further argue that this degree
of perceptual and embodied confusion is simply not a phenomenological
Despite Steins clarity on this, she is still portrayed by White (1997) and C. Davis (1990) as
supporting the notion of empathy-as-oneness.
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feature of peoples experiences of empathy. It lacks persuasive face validity.
As Gallagher (2007, p. 359) points out:
At the phenomenological level, when I see the others action or gesture, I see
(I directly perceive) [original italics] the meaning in the action or gesture. I see
the joy or I see the anger, or I see the intention in the face or in the posture or
in the gesture or action of the other. I see it. I do not have to simulate it. And I
immediately see that it is their action, gesture, emotion, or intention, and it is
extremely rare that I would be in a position to confuse it with my own.
Lipps concept of empathy implies a blurring of ones self-identity with
anothers, in a manner which is not consistent with most peoples experi-
ences. Indeed, in a clinical sense, this degree of fusion is usually seen as
either infantile or pathological. For example:
From object relations theory to transpersonal psychology, there is a presump-
tion that the newborn experiences the world in a preegoic fusion with the
primary caregiver and the world at large. (. . .) There may be similar empathic
fusion in adults who have unusually permeable boundaries and a symbiotic
relational style (see Johnson, 1994). In conventional diagnostic formulations,this may occur with some regularity in Borderline or Dependent personality
disorders. The symbiotic character style may know the other by introjecting,
or swallowing whole, the others experience without digesting the experience
so as to understand or appreciate it as the others. (Hart, 1999, p. 113/114)
For Stein, empathy involves a self-object connection, not a self-object
fusion. This is perhaps more in line with Heideggers mitsein(being with),
than with Lipps Einfhlung. Stein explicitly denies that empathy is a
fusionor even an analogical feeling of self-other similarity (p. 87). Hence,even though we might even feel something which, though weaker in degree,
is not altogether unlike them (Hateld et al., 2009, p. 20), it is not this feeling
that should be seen as empathic in nature.
To summarise then, for Stein, empathy is neither a reactionto anothers
experience (neither contagion, nor imitation, nor sympathy); nor any form
of intellectually-reasonedknowledge about anothers experience (neither infer-
ence, nor projection, nor fantasy, nor analogy, nor perspective-taking, nor
memory), and it is not a mergingof selves or feeling ofoneness. In Figure 2,we have illustrated how Stein applies her phenomenologically-derived
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criteria (right column) to exclude a number of related concepts and pro-
cesses as non-empathic phenomena. This list is not exhaustive, but it illus-
trates the reasoning behind Steins derivation of the essence of empathy.
For Stein, empathy is an interpersonal process lived as a direct coming-
to-know anothers experience. Or, better, more in line with a contemporary
phenomenological view, empathy is the intersubjectiveprocess of directly
knowing the foreign experience.
Figure 2: What Empathy is not: Steins logical path towards a pheno-
menological denition of empathy
Contagion
Imitation
Oneness
Sympathy
Identication
Empathy
isnot
Analogy
Projection
Association
Inference
MemoryFantasy
Simulation
Perspective-taking
EXCLUSION CRITERIA:
I personal response
I personal knowing
Produced by intellectual
activity
Mediated
Past intentional object
Undiffferentiated,
unconsious selfness and
otherness
Necessary similarity inexperiencing
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Three Levels of Empathy
There are three levels to Steins understanding of empathy, which meritfurther exposition. The term levelwhich Stein employsmay be slightly
misleading. There is not a strongly hierarchical element to her account.
Stein notes that while one might usually progress throughthe levels (from
rst, to second, to third) this is not always the case. As we will see, it is
possible to imagine that one might move from level 1 to level 3 (p. 10, p. 70).
For reasons which will become obvious, it is unlikely that Stein considered
that someone could be said to be having an empathic experience if they
had accessed only level 3, however.
Each of the levels she describes has particular dening characteristics,but each is also a way of knowing anothers experience. That is, the three
levels share one of empathys essential qualities: all are experiences which
bring anothers experience to our awareness. This means that, in a way, we
can look at these levels as diffferent kinds of empathic phenomena, or dif-
ferentways intoempathy.
We have attempted to label the three levels of Steins conception of
empathy in ways which are reasonably clear and meaningful to the con-
temporary reader. As we have named them, these levels are: 1. Directlyperceiving(the immediate perception of anothers present, minded, embod-
ied, embedded, experience); 2. Experientially projecting(the non-intellec-
tual experience of anothers unfolding experience); and 3. Interpretatively
mentalizing(the higher-level recognition and interpretation of our knowl-
edge of the others experience). In the following sub-sections, we expand
upon each of them in a little more detail.
Level 1: Direct Immediate Perceiving
For Stein, empathy is a founding or fundamental act, which, in this level,
has a status analogous to direct perception; that is, it is not a product of
other deliberated, intellectual, or cognitive processes (Stein, 1917/1989, e.g.,
p. 14; p. 20; p. 24; p. 27). Rather, it is the result of a perceptual act, which
directly brings anothers experience into ones own awareness. This distin-
guishes empathy from perspective-taking and simulation.
For reference, in Steins (p. 10) thesis, these are: 1) the emergence of the experience; 2) the
fullling explanation; and 3) the comprehensive objectication of the explain experience.
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What it is that We Perceive [Anothers Experience]
Direct perception is a special case of perception (a kind of an act of perceiv-
ing sui generis , p. 11), because what is immediately perceived is the for-eign experience. That is, it is not a meaningless external cue, such as a
gesture or a facial expression, into which some meaning is subsequently,
imaginatively, and intellectually, infused. Even though we grasp the others
experience with the same perceptual intention that we grasp a thing (Mous-
takas, 1994, p. 94) there is a contrast between ordinary perceptive acts and
empathic perception. The former bring concrete objects of the world
(physical objects, closely wedded in appearances, Prinz, 2006, p. 434) to
our awareness, but empathic perceptions bring us an experience in itsentire embodied and embedded form. In empathic perception, when we
perceive an expressive gesture, the gesture andits meaning are given to us
immediately and together.
A key feature of empathic perception is that it involves our immediate
knowledge of anothers present experience. It has the foreign experience
for its intentional object. Empathy is an act of perception, and the object of
that act is the embodied, embedded experience of another, as it is given in
consciousness. This distinguishes empathy from some related phenomena,
such as fantasy, or contagion.
How we do this [Directly, Immediately, Non-Inferentially]
Stein emphasises at the outset that empathy deals with grasping here-and-
now (1917, p. 7). She stresses (p. 10) that empathy is always the primordial expe-
rience (by which she means, immediate, here-and-now) of a non-primordial
We understand this adjective, in Steins thesis, to mean here-and-now, Bournemark
(2005, p. 124) translates it as original instead. Original accentuates a facet relative to theauthenticity or the source location. When Stein denes empathy as an act which is primor-
dial as present experience though non-primordial in content (p. 10), it would be precise to
infer that empathys content is originally located in the other (empathy being responsible
for its subsequent givenness to the perceiver). However, when Stein discusses acts of mem-
ory (p. 8), she highlights that memory deals with non-primordial phenomena. And, in
memory, the source is the perceiver. Hence, the term primordial cannot be read as relative
to the source location. To avoid this interpretation of primordial as meaning located in the
self, we dene primordial as present, actual, and here-and-now. In this quote, then, we
understand that Stein means that the empathic experience is happening in the now for the
perceiver, but its content (foreign experience) is not happening in the nowit is anothers
experience after all. Or, better, empathy is an intersubjective experience.
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source (the experience of another). These two aspects both contribute
to the nature of empathy: whilst the act, for the perceiver, occurs in the
here-and-now; the content of this act is not happening in the here-and-now, for the perceiver. The perceived experience is not presently occurring
to the perceiver, but to the perceived person. In this level, then, Stein
is concerned with what happens when we directly perceive anothers expe-
rience, as it unfolds in the present. This distinguishes empathy from mem-
ory, and contagion.
Stein refers to this possibility of perceiving the body and its experience
as empathys con-primordiality (1917, p. 57), or double given-ness
(p. 43)by which she means that seen, averted and interior sides aregiven to the perceiver at once. As Zahavi (2001) would add, experiences are
not internal, they are not hidden in the head (p. 153)hence, co-perceiving
anothers experience is a perceptive possibility. In phenomenology, expe-
rience is perhaps best understood as a kind of convenient, psychological
shorthand for our relationship to the world. It is located betweenperson
and world.
In short, much like any ordinary perceptive act, empathy happens here-
and-now, but specically to bring to our awareness the experience of
another. In everyday language we might understand this sort of perception
in terms of having a sense, an intuitive knowledge, or a feeling about
anothers experience. Steins preference is simply to say that we are able to
see the foreign experience, as it happens.
Example
Steins model of empathic perception, then, has a gestalt quality. She calls
this its con-primordiality. Stein uses a spatial metaphor to unpack this,
imagining that empathic perception might be understood by analogy withvisuo-spatial perception. Hence, here-and-now, in the present ongoing
moment, she suggests that it is as if the averted and interior sides of a spa-
tial thing are co-given with its seen sides. In short, the whole thing is seen
(1917, p. 57)the con-primordial concept.
Imagine that you perceive a chair. When you perceive it, you see the
presenting sides of the chair (those which face you), and you see the sur-
rounding area (the context). You would not literally see the back of the
chair (averted sides) or its underlying structure (interior sides), of course,
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but the chair is still perceptively given to you in its wholeness (i.e. as a com-
posite of its seen and averted sides andits structure). Under normal condi-
tions we do not perceive a fragmentary chair, composed only of that whichis literally accessible to our gaze.
In empathy, this analogy means that one simultaneously perceives at the
same time (co-perceives) the others outward, expressive, visible (seen
sides) and non-visible behaviour (averted sides), as well as the others expe-
rience (structure). This is what we mean when we say that for Stein the
given-ness of empathic perception is direct. In empathy, we directly co-
perceive body-and-mind, together, at once, in its context. We directly per-
ceive anothers minded, embodied, embedded, expressive experience. Wehave access to this gestalt other through empathic perceptive acts.
How Might this be Understood?
As we have seen, then, Stein views the givenness of anothers experience
as a core feature of empathy, and she wishes to emphasise that there is a
direct and unmediated quality to this. In her own text, Stein calls this level,
the emergence of the experience (1917, p. 10). This might suggest that she
sees empathic experience as a process, and one which begins at this level,
but this is not necessarily the case. Stein emphasises that in a concrete case
people do not always go through all levels (1917, p. 10), and that ones
empathic lived experience may be carried out in a manner diffferent from
her own order of presentation (p. 14/15; p. 70; see also Depraz, 2001 for a
similar formulation).
Steins approach is phenomenological, and not explanatory. However,
in the most recent phenomenological examination of empathys levels,
Depraz (2008, p. 172), relates this direct perception to Paarung (after Hus-
serl), or coupling (after Maturanas acoplamiento, 1975). Similarly, Zahavi(2007; 2001) sees direct perception as the most fundamental mechanism
underlying our daily interpersonal relationships. Empathy, he argues,
makes people intelligible to each other in a direct, immediate manner, and
is the core form of interpersonal knowledge. But even from a completely
diffferent background, relative to the study of neurosciences and articial
intelligence, a similar claim can be found: there is a kind of mind reading
which is in a certain sense purely perceptual and unaided by any verbal
theoretical elements (Rockwell, 2007, p. 2).
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Level 2: Experientially Projecting
Why Empathy is a Form of ProjectingStein herself describes this level as the fullling explication (1917, p. 10).
The reason for this is discussed below. We have chosen to emphasize
instead the importance of another feature of Steins perspective for this
level: the sense of empathy as involving a kind of transposal or projection
of the self.
Through an examination of Steins step-by-step elimination of what
empathy is not, we can conclude that, for her, empathic projections:
1) areexperienced(not reasoned, or imagined, or simulated, such as in per-spective-taking; 1917, p. 14); 2) are a means of accessing genuinely foreign
experiences(not hypothetical, probable, p. 27; nor conjured, or projected,
experiences, p. 20); and 3) this access is direct(not based in any kind of
past knowledge, such as the empathizers past experiences, p. 27) and
immediate.
In more common usage, projection is understood as an intellectual pro-
cess, based on pre-acquired knowledge and concrete evidence-based rea-
soning; and does not necessarily happen here-and-now. In contrast, Steins
projection is a very particular kind of projection. It is an experiential, non-
intellectual, and intuitive (1917, p. 20) kind of projection. This notion is
much closer to Lipps understanding of empathy, though it can be distin-
guished from contemporary neuropsychological theories because this is
still a direct non-simulative experience that is given as anothers. That is,
the experienced projection is not an intellectual simulation, and is imme-
diately co-perceived as foreign.
An ExampleImagine that we are watching a novice acrobat balancing on a wire. At rst,
we directly see his/her fear of heights (direct perception level). We may
also experience this fear to some degree, but for that experience to be an
Thompson (2001) offfers a similar reading by explaining this level as a kind of projection.
This supports our reading, even though, explicitly, in her text, Stein never connects empathic
projections, discussed at length, with the second level as put forward in the beginning of the
dissertation. Though, after careful analysis and consideration, this is the most reasonableand probable reading of her ideas for this level.
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empathic one, the fright could not be our own personal fear (e.g. contagion),
or an imagined probable fright (a simulated or remembered one), or a fear
forthe safety of the acrobat (Schelers fellow-feeling, or sympathy). Instead,it would have to be the acrobats fright, given to us via experiential projec-
tion. As we observe the acrobat, we may project into the objects experi-
ence, turning with it towards the wire and the depths below. At such a
point we are empathically given an experience of the acrobats own fear.
Critically, we experience it, not in the fullest sense (the sense with which
we might experience our ownfear, for our own safety), but only partially
as the acrobatsfear. The fright, for the empathising observer, is non-pri-
mordial; it is not happening in the here-and-now. It is anothersandhence distinct from contagion, as the latter is usually dened. After all, it is
not the empathiser who is balancing on the wire and experiencing fear
he/she is just watching the acrobat and having an empathic experience.
As Stein puts it, I am not one with the acrobat, but only at him. I do not
actually go through his emotions but quasi (1917, p. 16).
In the previous section, we noted that empathic perception has the
others experience for its intentional object (e.g. the acrobats fear). For
empathicprojection, the intentional object shiftsand we become focused
on the intentional object which is at the center of the othersexperience
(e.g. the high wire, the looming depths below). In both empathic projec-
tions and empathic perceptions, however, subject and object are not one,
because they are not having the very same single experience. The otherness
of the experience, implicitly a self-other diffferentiation, is one of empathys
dening attributes. The observer does not really feel any threat for him
or herself (only quasi fear), but rather gains access to the acrobats fear
by feeling it with him/her. Metaphorically speaking, it is a second-person
fear, where we are with the other, experiencing the others extant ongoingstate, almost as if we were having the experience ourselves, but aware
that we are not. In our example, for the empathising observer, the fear is
not happening here-and-now, and nor is the act of wire walking. The
experience and content are anothers, and yet we are withthe other, expe-
riencing it. Hence, Stein claims that this level exhibits the non-primordial
parallel to the having of the experience (1917, p. 10).
It is important to note that, for Stein, empathic experiences can be about
sensations just as easily as they can be about emotions. This makes sense
when we think about the features of her approach, but it is a dimension of
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empathy which is not always included in contemporary writing. In Steins
description, the movement from perception to projection is identical,
regardless of whether the observed experience is an emotion or a sensa-tion; a feeling into and then a feeling with. This idea is explored in her
thesis as sensual empathy (1917, p. 58/60).
Why Stein Calls this the Fullling Explication
Stein uses the term self-transposal. This delineation is applied in some con-
temporary work, too, such as when Depraz (2001) describes an equivalent
stage as being about a spontaneous, highly embodied, imaginative and kin-
aesthetic self-transposal to anothers experience. In Stein, this concept isperhaps closer to the notion of a sensing-in, a feeling-at, a feeling with
(p. 58)denitely not a feeling for (sympathy); or an imagined feeling, as
perspective-taking and simulation are usually conceived. It is an intersub-
jective experience all along.
From this point, it is easier to see why this second level might be referred
to as the fullling explication. Returning to the novice acrobats fear of
heights, recall that, initially, one empathically perceived the acrobats fear.
However, it is only through projectingintothis experience, that one is able
to explore this foreign experience, and to inspect its many sides. For
instance, one might acknowledge that the acrobat is looking beyond the
wire, down into the void below. This happens in an exploratory lived man-
ner, unfolding in the present with the foreign experience. Through this act,
other sides of the foreign experience are revealed, such as acknowledging
the trembling of the wire or the absence of a safety net. Consequently,
one fulls (the term adopted by Stein) ones awareness of the others
experienceor, at least, ones awareness is enriched. The act is an explica-
tion because it reveals in more detail and depth that which was initiallyperceived as merely fear.
It seems to us that referring to this as an imaginative projection, as
Depraz (2001) and Thompson (2001) have done, falls short of this levels
experiential, present-tense, intuitive, sensing-in essence. Imagination may
suggest that Steins view is much closer to intellectual conjecture, than it is;
as Stein points out, this experience is not about the feeling of ones own
experience via anothers screen (p. 20). It is about how we come to feel the
experience of another.
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Level 3: Interpretatively Mentalizing
Since empathy is often represented in psychology as partly, or wholly, anintellectualized ability, this level is probably the aspect of Steins account
which seem most familiar to a contemporary readership. Thompson (2001)
claims that, in this level, the experience faces me again, but now in a clari-
ed or explicated way (p. 16) and this level is usually seen as following on
from the explicative, experiential level. However, for us, this is not its most
distinguishing characteristic. What is fundamental, and fundamentally dif-
ferent, is that, for the rst time, empathy includes a clearly intellectual
facet, responsible for its more intellectual comprehensibility. Thus, with
this level, Stein describes the point at which the interpersonal process ofempathic knowing reaches its inevitable conclusionthis is where we
actively interpret our directly perceived feeling-in of the others experi-
ence, and it becomes more explicitly and linguistically accessible to us as
knowledge. Simultaneously, then, this is the point at which the process
more clearly resembles a non-direct ways of knowing the foreign experi-
ence, though still distinguishable because its intentional object is a directly
given foreign experience (not a deduced, inferred one).
What is Mentalized (The Foreign Experience)
Here, for the rst time, that which was directly intuitively given about the
others experience (during direct perception and/or experiential projec-
tion) is represented, in awareness, as a mental object. That is, the content
of the intuition is mentalized, becoming, in awareness, an intellectual idea
about the foreign experience. This is most transparent when Stein states
that, at this level, empathy can be seen as an intuitive idea about anothers
experience. Before this level, empathy is not an idea, or a representation,
but intuition only (p. 20). But now we have a form of knowledge about the
foreign experience, in the usual conception of the word knowledge.
Through mentalizationthe making of an experience into a mental
objectempathy becomes comprehension. The novel quality that we have
emphasised in the naming of this level is that this act partly transforms the
empathic experience into an intellectually intelligible one. More precisely,
during this level, the empathizer is nally given the foreign experience
in an intelligible, partly interpreted, manner. Consequently, the foreign
experience becomes once more, as it was during direct perception, theintentional object of the empathic actwith the diffference here that
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now the others experience is not the target of an intuitive act, but of a
mentalizingone.
Example
To extend the example of the acrobat, recall that, initially, the acrobats
fear was directly perceived (rst level). Then, the perceiver projected into
it, to explore some of its non-perceptively given sides (second level), say,
the escalating intensity of the acrobats fear. Then, nally, the perceiver
gives to the intuition an intellectual formwhich might hypothetically
mean the empathizer saying to him/herself that the acrobat is experienc-
ing something that could be called fear of falling (third level). In thisintellectual manner, the acrobats experience becomes an intelligibly inter-
pretedthus partly, or fully, comprehended; the empathic experience
completed. Hence, it is only through this level that empathy is, as previ-
ously noted, a more intellectual act through which the foreign experience
is comprehended (p. 6).
These three aspects (i.e. occurring after experiential projection; requir-
ing the making of the experience into a mental object; and being an
interpretative activity) explain the name given by Stein to this level: com-
prehensive objectication of the experience (p. 10).
The Importance of the Mentalization Level
For Stein, the empathic experience can only be complete with the intellec-
tual interpretative act (representation is the term she adopts), which is
simply the giving of an intellectual meaning to an intuition. More than
that, she even tells us that the empathic representation is the only fullment
possible (p. 57).
In order to understand the meaning behind this claim, we must inspectthe term fullment. We have used it in relation to the second level,
and translated it in terms of the enrichment and revelation of the non-
perceptively given aspects of the others experience. We have also noted
that Steins sees the third level as the fruition and end of the empathic pro-
cess. Metaphorically-speaking, we might imagine a river owing through
the earth, exploring the surroundings as it goes. This would be the experi-
ential fullment. At the point where the river reaches the ocean, in a sense,
it ceases to be a riverbut by ceasing to be, its path is complete. This would
be the representational act. When Stein claims that the empathic act can
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only be completed by establishing an intellectual representation, it as
though the empathic act arrives at its destination, and in doing so, the pro-
cess of knowing is transformed, and becomes something else.
Summary of Steins Approach
Steins phenomenological equation includes the self, the intentional act
(empathy) and its object (foreign experience). With this equation, Stein is
able to detect three kinds of empathic phenomena: direct perception;
experiential projection; and interpretative mentalization. And although
these ways into empathy are about the knowing of the foreign experience,it is only the latter (mentalization) that can be properly qualied as a form
of intellectual knowledge. The rst two are intuitive, not ideational.
In short, the rst level, direct perception, is about the direct, non-medi-
ated (e.g. by expressive behaviour or aprioristic knowledge) co-givenness
of another persons present embodied, embedded, minded experience.
Here, one immediately sees the foreign experience. The second level,
experiential projection, is about exploring, as if with the other person, their
unfolding experience. Here, one feels aspects of the foreign experience,some of which may not have been perceived at level 1. Finally, in the third
level, interpretative mentalization, empathy is transformed into an intel-
lectual, interpretative act. During this level, one recognises and represents
the others experience by forming an intellectual interpretation of what
was given of it. And, since the intentional object of this act is still an intui-
tively directly given foreign experience, then, although of an intellectual
nature, this is still an empathic act. This act completes the empathic experi-
ence. Although organized in a sequential manner, people may perhaps
enter into empathy at any of these levels, as they may even skip a few (p. 10,
p. 70)though level 3, alone, cannot count as an empathic experience. It
must always be an interpretation of either level 1, 2, or both.
These levels share some essential characteristics that distinguish them
from non-empathic acts of consciousness. First, the act of empathizing is
immediate, it is here and now experience (p. 7). Secondly, it is an inten-
tional act of consciousness. Thirdly, its intentional object is foreign (the
foreign experience, or the foreign intentional object). Fourthly, this experi-
ence is, to a great extent, direct, non-intellectual and non-mediated. Fifthly,empathy is specically about the knowing of anothers experience. Finally,
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what is given through empathy is always a second-person experience. It is
not an authentic personal experience. This is what essentially denes
empathy as a phenomenon across the three levels: empathy is the coming-to-know anothers experience.
Discussion
The direct implication of the nature of empathy is that selfness and other-
ness are never absent or confused. Rather, the otherness of the foreign
experience is permanently co-given with the empathizers experience, even
if only in the background of experiencing. Hence, self and other are alwaystwo beings with diffferent experiences and identities, even while relating
empathically: both experiences are actually diffferent in themselves (Stein,
1917, p. 23).
It is in this givenness of otherness that Steins empathy becomes more
clearly an intersubjective experience. For her, the empathic act can be
understood as intersubjective in nature, because it has two sides, it has two
essences (p. 19): 1) the foreign experience; and 2) ones own experience.
Consequently, it is fundamental in any interpersonal encounter, it acts asthe bases of intersubjective experience (p. 64) because it is how human
beings comprehend the psychic life of their fellows (p. 11)it is even seen as
a key to ones individuality. Empathy is then a core aspect of ones lived
daily experience, both in an individual and in an interpersonal sense. It
allows for a mutual interpersonal understanding.
Accepting this, the problem of how it is possible to perceive other minds
becomes one of those pseudo problems (Zahavi, 2001, p. 155). Reference to
the other is already inherent to ones being-in-the-world. For Stein, self-
other similarity is indeed enabled by empathy, but it is a non-empathic
phenomenon. It is a only its consequence, in the sense that, before the
apprehension of similarity takes place, the other must rst have been
directly given to oneself. That is, empathy allows for the understanding of
oneself as a living body among many other living bodies (p. 88).
Correspondence with Psychotherapeutic Theories
Stein describes three types of empathic experiences, though none of them
are commonly called empathy in the mainstream psychology literature.
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There are a few exceptions in the humanistic, existentialist and psycho-
dynamic approaches to psychotherapy, however (e.g., Bozarth, 2009; Geist,
2009; Rogers, 1957/2007; Zepf & Hartmann, 2008). There is no other areawhich is so fundamentally concerned with other peoples genuine experi-
ences as psychotherapy. And, in contrast with neurocognitive and develop-
mental psychology, some humanistic and psychodynamic approaches to
psychotherapy more commonly offfer a view of empathy much closer to
Steins conception.
In this particular Steinian sense, empathic understandings are con-
ceived as a key aspect of the therapeutic process. The therapists claims can
be received by the client as correct or incorrect, but, through the continu-ous maintenance of an empathic rapport, the client develops a sense of
realness, an awareness of being alive, personally present, and invested (Geist,
2009, p. 64) to the point when the accuracy of the intervention is less impor-
tant (with both right or wrong commentaries serving as an invitation for
exploration, and each responsible for personal growth).
For example, Rogers (Bozarth, 2009, p. 103, cf. Rogers, 1959, p. 210) pro-
poses that experiencing an accurate, empathic understanding of the clients
awareness of his own experience is a necessary condition for the success of
therapy. For him, empathy is sensing, perceiving (Steins level 1) and as if
experiencing (Steins quasi quality of level 2) the clients experience and
meaning:
The state of empathy, or being empathic, is to perceive the internal frame of
reference of another with accuracy, and with the emotional components and
meanings that pertain thereto, as if one were the other person, but without
losing the as if condition.
For Rogers, empathy is the perceptive ability of knowing anothers experi-
ential meaning; and it involves an experiential resonance side that is never
to be confused with a genuinely personal experience. Barrett-Lennards
(1981) description of empathy also seems to t with Steins views on inter-
subjectivity: It [empathy] is an experiencing of the consciousness behind
anothers outward communication, but with continuous awareness that this
consciousness is originating and proceeding in the other. (p. 92). A core
aspect of Barrett-Lennards understanding of empathy is precisely this
direct immediate relationship between beings. For Freud, this experience
corresponds perhaps to a temporary, partial, identication mechanism,
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used to get into anothers feelings without being directly implicated; and a
mechanism helpful for the psychoanalysts comprehension of what is felt
as foreign in the self of another person (e.g., Boulanger & Lanon, 2006;Zepf & Hartmann, 2008). Similarly, for Reik (1948; Arnold, 2006), psycho-
analytic listening involves an intuitive detection of the clients experiential
meanings, a perceiving of the tip of the iceberg of anothers initially
unknown psychic dynamics. From these perspectives, as with phenome-
nology, empathy fosters a moment-to-moment understanding of that eluding
otherness, that foreign, hence strange and perhaps estranged, experience.
A moment-to-moment awareness, from these perspectives, involves an
experiential resonation, an emotional (though the emotional adjectivefalls shorts of the meaning of experiential) and personal side, where the
impressions aroused in the individual are experienced as belonging to an
object (Zepf & Hartmann, 2008, p. 749), the location of clients and thera-
pists experiences are clearly diffferentiated, their belongingness clearly
given to the therapist throughout the empathic experience.
Thus, in the light of Steins work and these approaches, there is no need
to become an emotional stone-therapist, or to introduce a distance between
subject and object, as some have proposed (e.g., in the experience of empa-
thy, individuals must be able to disentangle themselves from others. This
distance is a key characteristic in psychotherapy, Decety & Jackson, 2006,
p. 56). Since there is no merging to begin with, any defusing or distancing
is irrelevant.
To conclude, Steins writings, thorough and detailed, can inform the
research, practice and teaching of psychotherapy, by illuminating empa-
thys lived experience, from the empathees side, one which is not com-
monly studied in this area (Greenberg et al., 2001).
Limits and Deception in Empathy
Stein answers to the question of authenticity by offfering that it is possible
to experientially distinguish between fake, or empty (p. 62; p. 77) expres-
sions; and genuine ones. Faking is in itself an experience, and one which is
empathically given to the empathizer as an empty one, we then generally
assume that empathy is about the givenness of anothers genuine present
experience.
However the empathic act is not free from error. Empathic experiencesare shaped by the empathizers life-long habits of intuiting and thinking
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R. W. Meneses, M. Larkin / Journal of Phenomenological Psychology 43 (2012)151184 179
(p. 62). That is, the intuitive and the interpretative acts are subjected to
habits, hence permeable to the empathizers past experiences and knowl-
edge, more vulnerable to the inuence of idiographic perspectives, precon-ceptions, or habits. Although these habits are not necessarily responsible
for inaccurate knowing (for example, they may just condition the selective-
ness of the empathizers attention), through them, empathy becomes sus-
ceptible to inaccurate or deceptive knowledge.
This potential inaccuracy is not restricted to empathic acts. Indeed, for
Stein, non-empathic acts more frequently generate deceptive knowledge.
For example, if the interpretation draws upon ones similar past experi-
ences (analogy) there is a heightened risk of deception: we come to falseconclusions if we empathically take our own individual characteristics as a
basis (p. 87).
Stein wishes to emphasize that the odds of inaccuracy can be reduced by
combining empathic acts and inferential, intellectual acts. For example,
the perceiver wonders whether pain (p. 85) is a good interpretation of the
others experience, and looks elsewhere for intellectual conrmation (as
offfered by external cues such as expressive behaviour and the context of
the experience). It is the content of the intuitive act that requires interpre-
tation, but it is the interpretation itself (level 3) that is usually prone to
evaluations of accuracy or falsity. This combination of acts helps us in
accurately interpreting equivocal expressions (p. 85).
Empathy does not necessarily reveal to oneself the foreign experience in
its entireness, as there is perhaps as well a sphere of absolute privacy
(Scheler, 1913, p. 10). Both self and other are never perceived as complete.
To use Steins expression, each is always absently available (Stein, p. 19),
to oneself and to another. Nevertheless, to only be given a partial aspect of
anothers experience does not make our access less direct, less experiential,less accurate, or less empathic: there is so to speak more to the mind of the
other than what we are grasping, but this does not make our understanding
non-experiential (Zahavi, 2008, p. 520).
As Barrett-Lennard (1981, p. 92) noted, empathic understandings are
about the knowing of at least those aspects of his awareness that are most
important to him at the moment. In fact, it is exactly this inaccessibility, this
limit, which I can experience (cf. Husserl, 1973a, p. 144). And when I do have an
authentic experience of another subject, I am exactly experiencing that the
other eludes me (Zahavi, 2001, p. 153). There is then a limit to that which
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180 R. W. Meneses, M. Larkin / Journal of Phenomenological Psychology 43 (2012)151184
can be accessed through empathy. Imagine that the acrobat was fearful,
but also thrilled with the performances suspense. By noticing only the fear,
the observer is still having an experience that is suitably described as anempathic experience.
In conclusion, empathic knowing can be inaccurately interpreted and
subjected to intuiting habits; and it does not necessarily reveal to the
empathizer all there is to know about the foreign experience. Despite this,
accuracy can be enhanced by complementing consecutive empathic acts
(moment-to-moment empathy) with non-empathic intellectual acts. They
can be used in a complementary fashion, with the goal of correctly inter-
preting that which was empathically experienced, but they are to be distin-guished by their nature.
Conclusion
Taken together, our argument suggests that conceptually, and in the light
of the lived experience, there is a social intuitive understanding that is not
properly explained by current empathy models. These models propose that
empathy may be understood as if it were a case of perspective-taking, anal-ogy, sympathy, mimicking, contagion, and/or fusion. These are alternative
forms of understanding that Stein does not accept as empathic, and their
distinctive nature is part of the experience itself (Stein, 1917, p. 62). Further-
more, many of these models seem to merge together several of the many
phenomena which empathy has been claimed to be (Batson, 2009), or
argue against each other (e.g., the feedback given to Preston & Waal, 2002)
as if they were referring to one and the same phenomenon.
For Stein, an empathic understanding is an experiential intuitive know-
ing of someone elses present experience that is not lived as a personal,
sympathetic or intellectual form of social understanding. This form of
interpersonal understanding is a natural everyday form of relating with
other people and their experiences. Recently there has been a revived interest
in Steins phenomenological claims about the nature of empathy, principally
in phenomenological and phenomenology-informed theories. For example,
Deprazs (2001) empathy levels; Gallaghers (2007) situated cognition;
Prinz (2006) perception of abstract content; and Zahavis (2008, 2001) non-
simulative direct perceptive access all draw upon Stein.Then, the empathy eld would benet from some conceptual revision and
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R. W. Meneses, M. Larkin / Journal of Phenomenological Psychology 43 (2012)151184 181
that might deserve to be empirically investigated, rstly qualitatively, to
gather evidence of its presence in peoples experiences of their social
understandings; and then also from within experimental and neuropsy-chology paradigms, so that the underlying processes may be put to test. As
Gurmin (2007), we propose that Steins phenomenological approach can
offfer neurologists a comprehensive account of empathy that will aid them
insofar as they relect on scientic explanations(p. 100), and that its impli-
cations have the potential to extend some way beyond this.9
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