Dr Erika Weisz, Harvard University

Building empathy through social psychological interventions

A central question in the study of empathy—the ability to share and understand others’ thoughts and feelings— is whether it can be meaningfully changed. Previous research suggests that interventions can induce temporary changes in empathy, but few studies address whether interventions can effect long-term empathy changes that practically affect people’s social lives. In two experiments, we endeavored to build empathy using a motive-based approach among first-year university students and seventh graders (12-year-olds), leveraging techniques from social psychology (mindsets and social norms). We find that interventions altering mindsets and social normativity perceptions differentially affect empathy and social behavior within these two groups. These findings suggest that motive-based empathy interventions are powerful tools for empathy building and present a new avenue for creating enduring and generalizable changes in empathy with real-world impact.

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