From ‘I think therefore I am’ era we have landed into the post-truth era of ‘I believe, therefore I am right’.
An interesting experiment was done on two apes. The moment one ape took out food to eat, the other one received a shock. After some time the ape who was receiving the food preferred to starve in order to avoid harming the other ape. Empathy is product of evolution, and is probably rooted in the neo-mammalian brain that generates emotion.
You feel empathetic towards people you can emotionally connect to, and experiments have shown that the best way to connect is through mimicking. Psycologists have named it ‘mirroring’. When an infant listens to cry of other infants, (s)he starts crying (Marvin Simner, 1971). Adults mimics too, albeit unconsciously. We all know how contagious yawning is. Its called unconscious synchrony, or herd instinct.
Mimicking is a survival mechanism, the same genetic expression that helps flock of birds to fly in formation and move towards the same direction. We constantly mimic when we are talking to others by adapting our body languages, tones and even accents to the person we are talking to. Human beings are social animals and mirroring helps us bind together. It also helps us to be empathetic because similar behaviour makes us seem familiar, feel comfortable and helps us trust each other.
Our perception of the entire universe, which includes every human being you know, is an interpretation of our brain based on the information it receives through our sense organs. Humans use themselves as the reference point to create perception about others. In other words, one needs to project oneself into another individual. Empathy gives us the ability to do that. Experiments showed that we can correctly predict others and thus be empathetic towards others when our mental sate is neutral or same as the other person. We miss judge people mostly when our mental states are not similar.
Interestingly, chimps mimic yawn too, but only when a member of their own community yawns, and not when they see someone from the other community yawn. Call it racism. Sherif and Tajfel’s 1954 experiment showed that it was very easy to divide people into ‘us’ verses ‘them’. The experiment supported the Realistic Conflict Theory which says that intergroup hostility can arise due to conflicting goals and competition over limited resources. In a study participants were shown a video of people being injected with a hypodermic needle. The participants showed more neurobiological activity (indicating empathy) when the injected person was of same race. We mirror those who we consider as ‘us’ more than those we consider as ‘others’.
Unknown person or animal were threat to our hunting and gathering ancestors. We still feel threatened when encountering ‘different’ beings. Decety and Jackson’s study show that when you encounter people who you consider as ‘other’, you are less likely to feel their pain and emotions. They write in their paper, ‘Shared neural representations, self-awareness, mental flexibility, and emotion regulation constitute the basic macrocomponents of empathy, which are underpinned by specific neural systems.’ To be empathetic you need to connect with the other person. William Ickes’s experiments show that it takes at least 30 minutes of being together to connect (Everyday Mind Reading by William Ickes) with a stranger.
With the rise of social media, humans are loosing the ’30 min’ face to face connect. It is easy to bracket someone as ‘other’ in the social media when you do not have to see the other person face to face. Once you add a tag to a person, that stays even when you meet (h)er/im. This, along with ‘confirmation bias’ based on the huge amount of information (including misinformation) in the internet, can easily give rise to polarised world view. From ‘I think therefore I am’ era we have landed into the post-truth era of ‘I believe, therefore I am right’. Building empathy in the age of technology and internet is not something we have evolved for, and hence we need to train ourselves for the future.
Right supramarginal gyrus, part of cerebral cortex, is that part of our brain that recognises lack of empathy and helps us correct it. It helps one look at the world from the perspective of others. Our brain’s neural circuitry is not rigid. Every thought and action creates new neural pathways and changes our brain. Our brain can be hacked, and it can even be trained to become empathetic.
Stories helps us get connected to different perspectives, and thus become more empathetic. To be more empathetic you need to create positive story in your brain about the other person. Travel, creativity and collaboration can make us more empathetic. One way of increasing empathy is to force yourself to be in other person’s shoe. When you are angry on someone, first calm down, curb your ego and reduce your emotional defensiveness. Be open to diverse opinions and try to find the common things that you share with the other person. Understand the problems (s)he might be facing that led to (h)er/is judgement.
Experiments have shown that mindfulness based stress reduction programs have changed the brain by increasing the density of grey matter in regions related to ‘learning and memory processes, emotion regulation, self-referential processing, and perspective taking’ (Holzed et. al, 2011). There are four stages of practicing empathy everyday. It starts with imagining and then practicing compassionate thoughts about loved ones, followed by self, then about a neutral person and finally ending with someone against whom you have a grudge. Practicing empathy this way is known to reduce stress leading to a healthier and happier life.
How many people can our brain be empathetic about? Should we focus on compassion rather than empathy? Need a different post for that!
REFERENCE
https://www.cjr.org/analysis/journalism_and_the_power_of_emotions.php
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-athletes-way/201310/the-neuroscience-empathy
https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/releases/compassion-training.html
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S092549271000288X
https://www.jneurosci.org/content/33/39/15466
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15537986
https://www.amazon.com/Age-Empathy-Natures-Lessons-Society/dp/0307407772
https://www.amazon.com/Human-Swarm-Societies-Arise-Thrive/dp/0465055680
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Realistic_conflict_theory
Written by Subhrashis Adhikari
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