Mental health problems, loneliness already among the youngest and polarization are rapidly increasing, especially after the Covid19 pandemic. A new large-scale research study, the CovSocial project, led by Tania Singer from the Max Planck Society, is helping people to reconnect with themselves, others and society at large.

Recent findings reveal that a ten-week partner-based mental online training program was able to boost resilience, empathy, compassion and deepen social connections. At the same time, these short daily, app-based practices done with another person, so-called Dyads, decreased loneliness, depression, anxiety and a negative outlook in life. Researchers hope that this training can be scaled worldwide to overcome loneliness and social divisions.

Study looks at when parental empathy emerges in their children
According to the data, 13 years old is something like the "magic number" age for when empathy starts to take root in children's personalities.

The longitudinal study traced how empathy develops across three generations. Morsa Images/DigitalVision via Getty Images

by Jessica A. Stern, University of Virginia and Joseph P. Allen, University of Virginia

Our new research shows that parents who express empathy toward their teenagers may give teens a head start in developing the skill themselves. In addition, adolescents who show empathy and support toward their friends are more likely to become supportive parents, which may foster empathy in their own offspring.

How we did our work
The KLIFF/VIDA study at the University of Virginia has tracked 184 adolescents for more than 25 years: from age 13 well into their 30s.

Starting in 1998, teens came to the university every year with their parents and closest friend, and a team of researchers recorded videos of their conversations. Researchers observed how much empathy the mother showed to her 13-year-old when her teen needed help with a problem. We measured empathy by rating how present and engaged mothers were in the conversation, whether they had an accurate understanding of their teen’s problem, and how much help and emotional support they offered.

by Gomathy Periathiruvadi 

Leading With Empathy Drives Results
A 2021 PwC survey of 3200 company leaders and employees found, “69% of organizations who adapted their culture mid-pandemic say culture offers a competitive advantage.” By investing in a culture of empathy, our employees show up not only committed to our company, but connected to their work. This sense of belonging and motivation has brought high productivity to our business. Treating employees with dignity leads to less burnout in the workplace. Employees that are valued, supported by and aligned with the culture, are much happier and productive people overall. I want to impart this to all company leaders.

Rakhi Ratanjee discusses the psychological benefits that engaging in reading fantasy has developing empathy. Rakhi Ratanje is a first year medical student at Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine.

Rakhi was born in South Africa and grew up in Southern California. Prior to starting medical school at GCSOM, she attended UCLA, where she majored in Psychobiology with a Minor in Global Health.

During her spare time, Rakhi enjoys reading, hiking, trying new food with friends, and yoga. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community

 The Effects of Listening on Speakers’ Attitude Structure
We build on Carl Rogers’ theory to test how participation in the Listening Circle workshop can influence the attitudes of speakers who interact with the workshop attendees. Rogers, in his work on Client-Centered Therapy argued that good listening is about trying to understand the other person’s point of view and achieving the other person’s reference point. Good listening, according to Rogers, means not only paying attention, and comprehension to the speaker’s message, but also a certain type

Description of the Study
We conducted a study in an organization to test our predictions using participants from a public organization which employs over 4000 people. The management in the organization sends its employees, as a matter of routine, to take part in various workshops designed to improve soft-skill, one of which is the Listening Circle. We were able to measure employees in these workshops as well as in control workshops that were highly similar in scope, but did not train its atendees in listening.
 

Leonard H. Calabrese, 
For readers of my column over the past decade, many will recognize that on numerous occasions I have chosen to discuss empathy.

I became interested in this topic nearly 20 years ago when I was charged to develop a course on medical humanism in our new medical school. Until then, although the notion of empathy was of interest to me, I had not yet given the science of empathy any formal thought. To learn more, I reached out to Mohammadreza Hojat, PhD, the prime architect of the Jefferson Empathy Scale, the most widely used metric to measure empathy in health care, and began a journey of inquiry and research. This journey into empathy in medicine has influenced my own personal reflective and clinical practice in so many positive ways.

BY CHARLIE ELIZABETH CULVERHOUSE
A new study conducted over 25 years has revealed how a parent's approach to showing their teenage child empathy can not only impact their kid's upbringing, but can in turn affect how their grandkids are brought up too. 

Parenting a teenager is an endeavour riddled with challenges for many parents. From dealing with and finding solutions for their 'disrespect and laziness' as well as helping them to prioritise their mental health while still encouraging those who don't want to revise for exams to do so, everyday poses some new hill to climb. 

And not to add to the pressure, but how you parent your teen could, in turn, impact how they raise your grandchildren when they eventually start a family of their own. 

Researching empathy across generations
Beginning in 1998, the teens, their mothers and their closest friend were all invited into the research lab at the University of Virginia to engage in problem-solving or advice-seeking first with their mom and then with their friend.

All interactions were recorded to code for maternal warmth and emotional support from mother to teen, followed by coding for similar behaviors in how teens supported their friends when the friend asked for advice. When the teens were in their 30s and had kids of their own, they were surveyed to ask about their parenting behavior and their children’s empathy.

by Guy Itzchakov
. Identifying the emotions behind repetitive content from the speaker is crucial for high-quality listening.

The solution lies within the speaker; the listener's role is to help draw it out of them.

Prompt speakers to explore deeper emotions and experiences that contribute to their repetitive disclosure.

Reflect on the speakers' concerns and help them articulate their underlying negative emotions.

Researching empathy across generations
Beginning in 1998, the teens, their mothers and their closest friend were all invited into the research lab at the University of Virginia to engage in problem-solving or advice-seeking first with their mom and then with their friend.

Empathy must be a choice. It is to imagine oneself in the position of another, suffering the same hurts and enjoying the same pleasures – without being that other person. That’s why empathy can work as a strategy.

A policeman shows great empathy when he is able to identify the criminal by the circumstances of the crime. He reads this “signature.”

Similarly, in war, the general must have enough empathy to understand his enemy’s capacities. By imagining himself in the same position, he can guess what his enemy will do, and intercept the attack, or close up his own exposed defenses. Wars have been won with ingenious empathy.

Empathy, powered by our brain's mirror neurons, is the unseen force that deeply connects us to others and makes our relationships more fulfilling, as discovered on my podcast episode ‘The bonds that bind’.

Imagine sitting in a movie theatre, completely absorbed in a gripping scene where the hero is dangling precariously from a cliff. Your heart races, palms sweat, and you find yourself leaning forward in your seat, as if you could somehow help pull them to safety. But why do you feel this intense connection to someone who doesn't even exist outside of the screen? The answer lies hidden within the intricate workings of our brains, specifically in something called mirror neurons. Discovered somewhat serendipitously by a team of Italian researchers in the 1990s, mirror neurons are a fascinating set of brain cells that react not only when we perform an action but also when we observe someone else performing the same action.

Setting flexible boundaries in an often rigid world
In this live 2-hour workshop with Karla McLaren, M.Ed., you’ll learn many ways to create and define boundaries that make plenty of room for the deep interactions that empathy requires.

Many highly empathic people have difficulty setting and maintaining boundaries, and this difficulty tends to come from a misunderstanding of what boundaries are and what they can do.

Many of us have been taught that boundaries should be rigid and wall-like, and this rigidity tends to reduce empathy (which is sometimes a good idea).

But healthy boundaries can also be living, flexible structures and agreements that shift and change with changing circumstances.

Rigid boundaries can be fine in some situations, but highly empathic people need boundaries that make room for the fluid and interactional ways they live in this often rigid and empathically challenging world.

Join Karla for an empathic exploration of boundaries that support empathy and deep interactions while protecting highly empathic people from overload.

Above all, what your teens need from you is uninterrupted time together to feel heard and understood. Empathy development doesn’t occur within the context of a single monologue, rather a series of chats over time. When your teens come to you for help or advice, drop everything (especially your devices) and listen.

SOCIETY NEEDS TO undergo an empathic revolution if we are to survive as a species, says Anita Nowak of McGill University speaking at PINC 15 in the Netherlands.

There is a spectrum of empathy, says Nowak, with pity at one end, empathy at the other and compassion and sympathy somewhere in between. Pity, while being an emotional reaction to someone else's pain, also involves an element of looking down on people -- this is where a lot of foreign aid and paternalistic philanthropy has come from. 

Evidence shows that shoving data in peoples’ faces doesn’t work to change minds.
by PAUL SUTTER 

I encounter pseudoscience everywhere I go. And I have to admit, it can be frustrating. But in all my years of working with the public, I’ve found a potential strategy. And that strategy doesn’t involve confronting pseudoscience head-on but rather empathizing with why people have pseudoscientific beliefs and finding ways to get them to understand and appreciate the scientific method.

A seminal study from 2011 led by Professor Sara Konrath, Ph.D., a social psychologist specializing in empathy and altruism at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, found that empathy among Americans had taken a nosedive, with U.S. college students in 2009 scoring 40% lower than students in the late-1970s.

These early findings led to media headlines proclaiming “the end of empathy.”  The original study posited multiple theories – including changes in media and technology, changing parenting and family practices, and increasing expectations of success – as possible explanations for what appeared to be a general decline in American compassion and kindness.