A term similar to sympathy in psychology is empathy, which is also translated as empathy and ecstasy. Empathy refers to the process of consciously empathizing to understand the thoughts and feelings of others. It is regarded as a cognitive ability rather than an emotional experience, and also as a stable personality trait.
Studies have shown that some mental diseases are related to the lack of empathy, such as narcissistic personality disorder, passive aggressive personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder, borderline personality disorder and autism.
Therefore, empathy is an important research topic concerned by personality psychology, social psychology, clinical psychology and psychiatry, and it is one of the important standards to measure the degree of individual socialization.
In recent 30 years, empathy has become one of the research contents of cognitive neurobiology. In particular, EEG and fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging), neuroimaging methods that use magnetic resonance imaging technology to track the changes of cerebral blood flow, can intuitively display the brain regions involved in empathy. The birth of technology greatly promoted the research progress of empathy in neurobiology.
Man is a social animal. Empathy is a basic ability and personality trait evolved by human beings to promote prosocial behavior and moral reasoning. It can help us better understand and predict other people's emotions and behaviors. We can be happy because of other people's happiness and suffer because of other people's pain. Therefore, empathy can promote altruism and cooperation, and people with empathy will often lend a helping hand to people in need and provide support, making it easier to cooperate and share. Empathy plays a very important role in interpersonal communication. People with empathy will have successful and satisfactory interpersonal relationships and a higher sense of happiness in life.
China's theory of compassion is the closest to empathy. For thousands of years, we have developed a lot of practical empathy, such as putting ourselves in others' shoes, empathizing with others, putting ourselves in others' shoes and empathizing with others. One of the essences of Confucianism: "Don't do to others what you don't want others to do to you" is the most practical empathy, just like empathy.
The research on empathy shows that although empathy can be inherited, environmental factors such as personal growth experience, parental rearing patterns, social culture and so on will also have an important impact on empathy. Moreover, empathy is also influenced by the interaction between genes and culture.
Fortunately, empathy can be improved through effective training. A few years ago, an experimental study in the west confirmed that just one day of "sympathy training" related to empathy increased the positive emotional experience. This process, which aims at prosocial feelings and motivations, has triggered changes in neural networks and significantly increased the activities in the core areas of the brain related to empathy.
In the group therapy for patients with social anxiety and phobia, the author found that if I can cultivate the empathy ability of visitors in the group therapy for about 8 weeks, it will have a positive effect. I also found that when visitors' empathy ability is improved, it will not only help to reduce their social anxiety and phobia, but also improve their motivation and ability to communicate with others.
The same is true in the consultation of parent-child relationship, marriage relationship, classmates and colleagues. Consciously cultivating the empathy ability of visitors will effectively alleviate their psychological symptoms and improve their relationship.
Empathy can also be improved through self-education The most important way is to practice empathy and learn to look at the problem from the perspective of others.
Now let's do a little test. You are sitting on the bus. At this moment, an old man or a pregnant woman or a baby came over. They come to your seat and stop. Do you feel uneasy at this moment? Will it be unbearable? If so, then you already have the ability to empathize. If you stand up and give up your seat like a reflection when you see them, then you not only have the ability of empathy, but also have developed the habit of altruism.
With this trait of empathy, you basically have good interpersonal relationships, and you have made practical contributions to the beauty of this society and the happiness of your personal life.