Parents & Children – About Empathy

By Prof. Dr. J. Cassidy

Empathy is the capacity to understand and resonate with emotions beyond one’s own, and to care for others’ welfare. Evolutionary theory places empathy at the heart of humans’ ability to understand others’ intentions, to respond altruistically to the needs of kin and group members, and to forge cooperative social relationships. From a developmental perspective, nurturing this capacity to understand and care for others in childhood has long-term implications for building a kinder, more compassionate society.
Across development, individual differences in empathy predict the quality of children’s social interactions, with more empathic children demonstrating greater prosocial behavior and earning greater acceptance among peers (Denham, McKinley, Couchoud, & Holt, 1990). Conversely, lack of empathy has been associated with problems of aggression and bullying in childhood. These early aggressive tendencies place children at risk for more serious violent and delinquent behavior later in development. In turn, deficits in empathy in adulthood are associated with child abuse, violence, and psychopathy it is important to understand the developmental antecedents of empathy, particularly in early childhood, when individual differences first become apparent in everyday interactions with peers. Theory and research suggest that parental characteristics and the quality of the parent–child relationship are
2 crucial contributors to children’s social functioning across a variety of domains. Specifically, parents’ own empathic capacities may contribute to children’s empathy; however, the transmission of empathy from parent to child remains poorly understood. Read study by E. Browne