Empathy is the ability to relate on an emotional level to another person’s feelings from their perspective and to some degree is typically accompanied by a mutual expression of emotions.

Compassion is a more cognitively mediated variant of empathy where one’s own emotional state is not inexorably associated with that of the other person. Rather the emotional expression additionally presents as a greater capacity for making informed choices and motivation towards helping the person.

Empathy is a more reactive based modality of emotional processing and motivation than compassion and can be followed by rather negative consequences such as causing emotional burnout if prolonged or exaggerated expression is sustained.

Compassion builds upon the emotional understanding of empathy with altruistic intent and therefore is inherently favourable for alleviating suffering and improving the well-being of others. Empathy on the other hand can have reversed implications as the suffering of others can acutely distress the empathiser, causing adverse psychological impact as well as negating their potential to be of help (Batson et al., 1987). This is often observed in doctors and veterinarians and likely accounts for the disproportionately high suicide rate in these professions (Moir & Brink, 2020). Overcoming empathic fatigue can be facilitated by switching to a compassionate rather than empathic approach which has better health implications and is more sustainable in the long term.

Studies investigating the neurological differences between empathy and compassion displayed marked differences in brain region activation. Study participants trained in empathy enhancement predictably increased in their emotional and neural mirroring of observed suffering subjects. Furthermore, the negative psychological side effects of empathizing were magnified (Klimecki et al., 2013). Neural imagery confirmed that the anterior midcingulate cortex and insula were active as would be expected with self-experience of pain. Thus, empathising with pain of another shows neural correlation with direct pain experience, albeit with a lowered network activation and is limited to the affective but not somatosensory regions (Singer et al., 2004). The same test group was later trained in compassionate apprehension of suffering subjects. This method proved to nullify adverse psychological effects that empathizing induced, whilst increasing beneficial ones as fMRI analysis verified, with increasing Medial Orbito-Frontal Cortex, Pregenual Anterior Cingulate Gyrus and striatum activity: Regions forming the network responsible for reward and social cohesion.

Empathic association extends more prominently towards next of kin, followed by friends and lastly strangers. This was highlighted in research comparing fMRI analysis of direct pain, pain afflicted upon a loved one and pain afflicted to a stranger, which showed a sequential reduction in the activity of brain regions responsible for processing pain, in this respective order. Thus revealing that our brains are hardwired to empathise with those nearest and dearest (Cheng et al., 2007).

Empathy on the one hand is important for psychosocial functioning and social prosperity but is susceptible to inducing adverse effects such as emotional fatigue and distress which can give rise to withdrawal for self-preservation and thus reduce ones caring aptitude and motivation. It is also more taxing as renders greater psychological stress without the positive aspects seen in compassion, such as dopamine and reward pathway activation, which has energizing effect thus improving motivation in this case towards altruistic affairs.

To develop compassion technique in some Buddhist traditions involves occupying a loving-kindness mindset which is first applied to oneself, then emanates towards those close, followed by those we have no connection to, then potential antagonists and finally all people without reservation.  Secular compassion to some extent is a natural progression achieved through transitioning from child to adult to elderly. In the secular model, compassion supersedes empathy which is itself preceded by empathic contagion.

Empathic and compassionate training have shown no overlap in brain region activity. In fact, compassionate training involved brain network activation distinct from any other network governing emotional response except for unconditional love (Beauregard et al., 2009).

There is a significant disparity between empathy and compassion in both experiential and neural perspectives as well as Buddhist and secular perspectives. Compassion is theoretically aimed towards all people equally regardless of affiliation and is a more sustainable practice conducive to enhanced altruism, health and wellbeing. Empathizing competence by contrast correlates to the degree of familiarity one bears to the subject and an empathic approach carries maladaptive health risks and is thus less sustainable. Future studies might compare how the experience and neural correlates or compassion parallel with experiential development as exemplified by doctors who frequently suffer emotion fatigue until they learn to adopt a compassionate rather than empathic approach.

 

Mario Beauregard, Jérôme Courtemanche, Vincent Paquette, Évelyne Landry St-Pierre (2009). The neural basis of unconditional love. Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, Volume 172, Issue 2, Pages 93-98.

Batson, C.D., Fultz,J., Schoenrade,P.A. (1987). Distress and empathy: two qualitatively distinct vicarious emotions with different motivational consequences. Journal of Personality, 55, 19–39.

Klimecki, O., Leiberg, S., Ricard, M., Singer, T. (2013). Differential Pattern of Functional Brain Plasticity after Compassion and Empathy Training. Social cognitive and affective neuroscience. 9. 10.1093/scan/nst060.

Singer, T., Seymour, B., O’doherty, J., Kaube, H., Dolan, R. J., & Frith, C. D. (2004). Empathy for pain involves the affective but not sensory components of pain. Science, 303(5661), 1157-1162.

Cheng, Y., Lin, C.P., Liu, H.L. et al.(2007). Expertise modulates the perception of pain in others. Current Biology, 17, 1708–13.

Moir, F.M. & Van den Brink, A.R.K. (2020). Current insights in veterinarians’ psychological wellbeing, New Zealand Veterinary Journal, 68:1, 3-12, DOI: 10.1080/00480169.2019.1669504