Cultivating Empathy in Children

You can explain that empathy is placing yourself in the shoes of another person (wearing his/her sneakers or glasses) - seeing the world from his/her perspective. If the other person hurts, you too will feel that hurt. With children, it’s often helpful to pursue role-plays to help them better understand how their peers may feel in certain situations. You can also have them do “If/Then” statements to note that “if” this happens, “then” it might be best for me to do that.

A large amount of teasing is often due to insecurity. The child may feel insecure him/herself, and he/she may superficially and temporarily feel more secure when he/she is able to put someone else down or when he/she is able to feel superior to someone else. At times, the perpetrator may lack empathy and perspective-taking, as well.

While they may share negative comments, you have an opportunity to share positive comments and to fill her lingual world with positive words and statements. I’d focus on that positive language and perhaps explain to your family how important it is to model appropriate language in the home.

Empathy is the emotional or affective part of perspective-taking, while Theory of Mind is the cognitive feature of perspective-taking. Children typically develop a Theory of Mind by age 4 or 5. However, individuals on the autism spectrum often struggle with a clear Theory of Mind even at later ages. Children typically start off as highly egocentric and as they get older, they begin to incorporate more and more the perspectives of others and are therefore more capable of empathy as they develop.

I would differentiate between emotional/affective perspective-taking as being most closely related to Empathy and cognitive perspective-taking as referring to Theory of Mind. In addition, Davis (1980) discussed the various factors that are related to empathy based on his Interpersonal Reactivity Index. The four factors include Perspective-Taking, Personal Distress, Empathic Concern and Fantasy.

You can let them know if his/her comment is unkind, but most importantly I would encourage your child to take a moment to say hello and get to know someone with a disability or difference. I think all parties could benefit from a kind introduction.

Teaching emotion recognition, facial decoding or going through a variety of role-plays and scenarios may help an individual on the spectrum develop empathy. These lessons and role-plays can be repeated to try and ensure that the individual on the spectrum could generalize them to future scenarios.

There is a test known as the “False Belief Task” that tends to test for Theory of Mind, the more cognitive form of perspective-taking; however, you can always ask a child how he/she believes his or her friend may feel in a variety of situations. This should help you gauge whether or not your child is successfully developing empathy. His/her actions when others are in distress will also be telling.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8hLubgpY2_w

Toddlers can begin to decode facial expressions and to understand when their peers are upset. They can also begin to understand their friends’ preferences. Practicing facial decoding, turn-taking, sharing and trying to guess their friends’ preferences are all helpful empathy-based activities you could pursue with a toddler.

The Interpersonal Reactivity Index (Davis, 1980) is often used with adults, but The False Belief Task can be used successfully with children to at least get at the Cognitive Form of Empathy, Theory of Mind.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8hLubgpY2_w

While typically developing children appear to pass false belief tasks by age 4 or 5, empathy continues to develop as they start to incorporate others' perspectives. It’s important to give them enough social exposure to allow them to practice facial decoding, sharing, turn-taking, helping those in distress, etc.