Echoing the emotions of others: empathy is related to how adults and children map emotion onto the body

ABSTRACT

Empathy involves a mapping between the emotions observed in others and those experienced in one’s self. However, effective social functioning also requires an ability to differentiate one’s own emotional state from that of others. Here, we sought to examine the relationship between trait measures of empathy and the self-other distinction during emotional experience in both children and adults. We used a topographical self-report method (emBODY tool) in which participants drew on a silhouette of a human body where they felt an emotional response while watching film and music clips, as well as where they believed the character in the film or performer was feeling an emotion. We then assessed how the degree of overlap between the bodily representation of self versus other emotions related to trait empathy. In adults, the degree of overlap in the body maps was correlated with Perspective Taking. This relationship between cognitive empathy and degree of overlap between self and other was also found with children (8–11 years old), even though children performed worse on the task overall. The results suggest that mapping emotions observed or imagined in other’s bodies onto our own is related to the development of empathy.     

On Creating a Theory of Feminist Therapy

Feminism implies, and comes out of, a phenomenological philosophy. This means that we know what is true not by the "givens" of society, but by listening to our inner experience and that of others. The fundamental political act is the same as the fundamental therapeutic act: it is the process of joining another person's experience in a way which enables that person to make explicit her internal knowledge of what is real. The therapeutic stance, which implies a belief in the basic rightness of a person's way of being in the world, is what makes this kind of experimental knowing possible. To carry our thinking and practice of feminist theory forward in an authentic way, we must approach ourselves and one another from a therapeutic stance. From this we can begin to formulate a reality which encompasses the experience of those who have thus far been invisible and silenced. This article uses the problem of boundary violations as an example of a current issue in feminist therapy that can be explored from an experiential perspective. The questions that come out of this perspective can inform our creation of a therapy and society that is truly pluralistic.     

The Call of the Wild Woman

Abstract

Women have a longstanding and unique connection to healing and health care. The feminine perspective, however, has been discounted and decimated through the last 600 years. Now general social and political changes, as well as increasing numbers of women practitioners in health and mental health, are leading to a re-emergence of the feminine perspective in addressing women's needs and in providing health care. This paper traces some of the elements in the history of women and their influences on present day models of health care. It emphasizes women's roles as healers, as patients and as crafters of a new synthesis of health care delivery in the 21st century.     

Seeking spirituality through physicality in schools: learning from ‘Eastern movement forms’

This paper argues that we might learn from the ways in which Eastern movement forms with a self-cultivation focus approach the development of spirituality through physicality. It also argues that these movement forms have potential to assist in the development of children’s spirituality in school and Physical Education (PE) settings. First, the paper highlights a distinctive orientation to self-cultivation at the heart of which lies a focus on uniting body and mind through regular movement-based practice. Next, differing relationships between these movement forms and spirituality are identified as: fragments of established religious spirituality; spiritual exercise; and secular religious spirituality. Finally, three common pedagogic principles of these movement forms are highlighted and applied to the school and PE context: identifying self-identity and emotions; prioritising direct experience and changing the body-self through practice. It is suggested that these understandings of self-cultivating Eastern movement forms may help sensitise educators to approaching the cultivation of spirituality through physicality in schools using, not only Eastern movement forms but also Western activities delivered in accordance with these principles.     

Philosophy of Mind,Past and Present

This article attempts to summarize a few criteria of progress in philosophy—clarifying problems; rejecting false theories; opening new perspectives in familiar fields; inventing new arguments or thought experiments; and so on—and to apply them to contemporary philosophy of mind. As a result, the article concludes that while some progress was obvious in the past fifty years, there is much work yet to be done. It then tries to outline a transformation of conceptual analysis needed for further developments in this field. The author argues that conceptual analysis might be revived if it is treated as a clarification of the relations among our natural beliefs.     

The Effect of Attachment Insecurity in the Development of Eating Disturbances across Gender: The Role of Body Dissatisfaction

The present study examined the effects of insecure attachment on the development of negative body image as a contributing factor to the development of disturbed-eating patterns in male and female university students. Participants were nonclinical male (n = 100) and female (n = 381) university students. Administering self-report questionnaires, the authors assessed demographic information (gender, age), anthropometric data (Body Mass Index [BMI], age), romantic attachment (ECRS-R; R. C. Fraley, N. G. Waller, & K. A. Brennan, 2000), body dissatisfaction (BSQ), and disturbed eating (EAT-26). The authors found body dissatisfaction to fully mediate the relationship between attachment anxiety and disordered eating in women. Body dissatisfaction mediated anxious attachment and dieting in men. In addition, attachment avoidance had a direct impact on eating behaviors for both genders, without the mediation of any variables measured in this study. The findings of the present study suggest that the anxiety and avoidance dimensions of attachment insecurity affect eating behaviors differently, and the effects are different across genders. The authors discuss results in the context of therapeutic interventions design.     

Body Image Preference in the United States and Rural Thailand: An Exploratory Study

The authors conducted a field study to examine the female body image preferences of young women and young men in a rural northern province of Thailand and in central California. The Thai participants did not have stronger body image preferences than did the U.S. participants overall. However, the young women preferred a significantly more slender body image than did the young men, F(1, 80) = 14.98, p < .001, and the Respondent Gender x Nationality interaction was also significant, F(1, 80) = 4.42, p = .039. Thai men, as expected, exhibited preferences for figures that were heavier than those preferred by their U.S. counterparts. Thai women, in contrast, exhibited preferences for figures that were thinner than those preferred by their U.S. counterparts or their male countrymen. These results are explained in terms of traditional Thai and U.S. values and in terms of Western cultural influences in modern Thailand.     

Embedded-Figures Performance and Telecourse Achievement

This study was conducted to determine if there is a relationship between the cognitive style of community college students and their achievement in a broadcast telecourse. The subjects were 134 community college students enrolled in one of six telecourses. Witkin's Group Embedded Figures Test (GEFT) was used to ascertain whether the students' cognitive style was field dependent or field independent. Achievement was defined by the grade the student earned in the telecourse. Results of chi-square tests indicated that students with a field-independent cognitive style earned higher grades, had a higher telecourse completion rate, and were more satisfied with the experience.     

The Role of Career Aspiration,Self-Esteem,Body Esteem,and Gender in Predicting Sense of Well-being Among Emerging Adults

During emerging adulthood, one’s sense of well-being undergoes many rapid changes. Although emerging adults often present considerable energy, creativity, and hopefulness, both in higher education classrooms and workplaces, they often experience a decrease in well-being due to experience confusion, stress encounters, and difficulties in transitioning to adulthood. The authors examined four noteworthy key socioemotional factors that may be linked to emerging adults' sense of well-being: career aspiration, self-esteem, body esteem, and gender. Three hundred 20- to 29-year-old university students participated in the study. Results showed that well-being was correlated positively with self-esteem and body esteem, and body esteem was correlated negatively with gender (men scored higher). Regression analyses revealed that for both men and women, self-esteem and body esteem predicted well-being. Nevertheless, when the gender was analyzed separately, career aspiration predicted well-being only for men, whereas body esteem predicted well-being only for women. The study findings illuminates the importance of generating preventive measures in childhood and adolescence, through reinforcing skills such as resilience and self-esteem with the aim of passing through emerging adulthood with as little harm as possible to the sense of well-being.