Empathy as a Factor for Change

Research in empathy and compassion as a factor for

change:

Lidewij Niezink, PhD

Empathy Circles: A Factor for Change

How our world is Changing


Google Books (corpus English) 1900-2008



Google Trends analyzes a portion of Google web searches to compute how many searches have been done for the terms you've entered, relative to the total number of searches done on Google over time.



Problem: what is empathy?



Input from diverse fields of scientific enquiry:

•Psychology•Neuroscience•Biology•Philosophy•Arts / Humanities•Anthropology•etc


The Empathy Umbrella: Explosion of output!


The Empathy Umbrella: We all contribute


The Empathy Umbrella: How can we come together?

Combining Research and Walking the talk:


Empathy Circles

• Open to anyone with a willingness to practice empathy.• Focussed on deepening different empathic skill

components.• Offer a platform: from a need to be heard to a space to

listen.• International: online, through Google Hangouts: on

youtube


Empathy Circles:


Empathy Circles: Intention

• Stepping out of reactivity into intentionality.• Behavioral intentions predict intentional behavior

(Ajzen, 1991) depending on ultimate interest.• I am willing to empathize: from ultimate (society/

culture) to specific (in this circle).


Ritualize Intention


Empathy Circles: Self-Empathy

• Mindfulness / Open awareness• Meta-cognition: the ability to know that we know, to

observe that we think (Flavell, 1979).• Self-Compassion: extremely important for emotion

regulation (Neff, 2003).• Non-Judgemental


Empathy Circles: Mirrored Empathy






Empathy Circles: Reflective Empathy• Rogers: Client Centered Therapy• When reflected: Better Emotion Regulation

• Less negative affect after describing conflict• More alignment (language and ideas)


Empathy Circles: Imaginative Empathy• Cognitive empathy / theory of mind (ToM) or

mentalizing: the ability to represent and understand the mental states of others.

• Empathic accuracy: 25-35% (Ickes, 2003)• Block: projection• Perspective taking: self vs other

• Story telling / Role play / Fantasizing


Empathy Circles: Empathic Arising

• Mysterious consequence... Action/creativity• Arising in the moment, signalled by arousal.• A feeling of belonging due to the circle process• Tapping into motivational system• Building resillience?


Empathy Circles:


Empathy Circles: Building a Culture

• Restorative Empathy Circles• Family Empathy Circles• Mediation Empathy Circles• Scholarly Empathy Circles• Charter for Compassion Book Club Empathy

Circles


Empathy Circles: Invitation• Participate in a circle.• Help us in researching the effects of the circles• Join us in applying your findings!• Want to know more? It is all online ;-)


Blowing our intention into the world

Real Estate

Empathy as a Factor for Change