Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- List of contributors
- Part I ‘Dysempathy’ in psychiatric samples
- Part II Empathy and related concepts in health
- 9 Neonatal antecedents for empathy
- 10 The evolutionary neurobiology, emergence and facilitation of empathy
- 11 Naturally occurring variability in state empathy
- 12 Neuroimaging of empathy
- 13 The neurophysiology of empathy
- 14 The cognitive neuropsychology of empathy
- 15 The genetics of empathy and its disorders
- 16 Empathogenic agents: their use, abuse, mechanism of action and addiction potential
- 17 Existential empathy: the intimacy of self and other
- 18 Empathizing and systemizing in males, females and autism: a test of the neural competition theory
- 19 Motivational-affective processing and the neural foundations of empathy
- 20 Face processing and empathy
- Part III Empathy models, regulation and measurement of empathy
- Index
20 - Face processing and empathy
from Part II - Empathy and related concepts in health
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 August 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- List of contributors
- Part I ‘Dysempathy’ in psychiatric samples
- Part II Empathy and related concepts in health
- 9 Neonatal antecedents for empathy
- 10 The evolutionary neurobiology, emergence and facilitation of empathy
- 11 Naturally occurring variability in state empathy
- 12 Neuroimaging of empathy
- 13 The neurophysiology of empathy
- 14 The cognitive neuropsychology of empathy
- 15 The genetics of empathy and its disorders
- 16 Empathogenic agents: their use, abuse, mechanism of action and addiction potential
- 17 Existential empathy: the intimacy of self and other
- 18 Empathizing and systemizing in males, females and autism: a test of the neural competition theory
- 19 Motivational-affective processing and the neural foundations of empathy
- 20 Face processing and empathy
- Part III Empathy models, regulation and measurement of empathy
- Index
Summary
Introduction
The central issue to be explored in this chapter is the relation between perceiving an emotion in another and the triggering or re-creation of one or more aspects of that emotional state in oneself. This is what I shall sometimes refer to as ‘perceptually mediated empathy’, as distinct from ‘cognitive empathy’, where the subject represents someone else's state through top-down processes such as imaginative projection (e.g. Goldie, 1999; Preston & de Waal, 2002).
It has been suggested that a primary function of perceptually mediated empathy is to enable the recognition of emotional expressions, via processes of emotional contagion and simulation (Adolphs, 2002; Gallese et al., 2004; Goldman & Sripada, 2005). There is currently a lot of excitement about this idea. Is all the fuss justified? I shall demonstrate that while there is indeed cause for excitement, the evidence to date is far from able to warrant claims that processes of emotional contagion and simulation provide the sole, primary, or even an important means by which we come to know what others are feeling. There are several other possible functions of perceptually mediated empathy, about which I have little to say, other than some general thoughts at the end of the chapter about the developmental role of perceptually mediated empathy in enabling a more general ‘mindreading’ or ‘Theory of Mind’ capacity.
I ought to note two points of conceptual clarification before continuing. First, consider the distinction between perception and recognition.
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- Empathy in Mental Illness , pp. 360 - 386Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2007
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