In this article from the Listener’s 2017 archives, Catherine Woulfe considers whether an overdose of empathy hinders or helps our kids.
Paul Bloom is married to fellow psychologist Karen Wynn, who directs Yale’s prestigious Infant Cognition Center. They have two teenage sons. His worst moments as a parent, he says, are those when he’s been empathetic – when his child being upset has upset him.
Think about it: when a child is scared of the dark, does it do any good to get spooked yourself? Does yelling at a toddler mid-tantrum snap her out of it? Bloom recalls one of his boys working himself into a panic over homework that hadn’t been done. “I’d step back and think, ‘Okay, I understand what your problem is, I love you, you’re great. Let’s figure something out.’ And I’m calm. I think that’s when I’m a best friend and a best husband and a best parent.”
Further, he points out that sometimes being a good parent means doing precisely what the child does not want, for example, packing them off to bed when they’re desperate to stay up late. An overdose of empathy would hinder, not help. The role of empathy in relationships is one area, though, where he’s now having second thoughts. “Sometimes I think we do want emotional empathy [from those we love]. When my wife gets angry, I think she wants me to get angry, too.” And he agrees with philosopher Michael Slote that sometimes genuine, empathetic enthusiasm should be part of the mix. Say your child becomes excited about a new hobby, Slote posits. Surely, it’s better to actually share that excitement, rather than keep a careful emotional distance. So, what should we be teaching children about empathy? At the moment, parents are encouraged to explicitly foster it. When one toddler refuses to share or hits another child, for example, a recommended reaction is to sit the culprit down and ask, “How do you think James is feeling? What can we do to make him happier?” The same goes for reading books: “What is Cinderella feeling when she’s scrubbing those floors? Why do you think her step-mother might be treating her like this? What could her stepmother do to help Cinderella feel better?” Fine, so far as it goes, says Bloom. A large part of that learning is cognitive empathy, “and it’s always a good thing to know what other people are thinking.
“But I honestly don’t think that’s the right track. The problem with a lot of empathy training as a way of getting us to be moral people is that it’s not sensitive enough to limits and biases of empathy.” So here’s his add-on. “Treat your kid with love and kindness and get them in the habit of thinking morally, not responding based on their gut feelings.” The dinner table is a great place to do this, Bloom says, it’s a place to encourage children “to generate arguments and respect them from others”.
A sample conversation: “You know, kid, you might feel a real lot for one person, but you can’t feel much for 100 people – your mind doesn’t work that way. But you’ve got to realise that 100 lives are worth a lot more than one life, and maybe at some point you will have to decide between them [for example, by voting or supporting policy]. Or: “Think about somebody in a faraway land. You have nothing in common. This person doesn’t look like you and maybe doesn’t like you. It’s very hard to know what it’s like to be him. Now compare him with one of your close friends in school, who you feel a lot of empathy for. Now you should know, if you think about it, your sentiments don’t matter.”
Bloom would like everyone who works with children to appreciate “that morality is not just a matter for the heart, it’s not just a matter of feelings”.
“Often what it is to be a good person – I think very often – is the ability to recognise that they feel they should go one way, but the right thing to do is something else.”
This article originally appeared in the April 15, 2017, issue of the New Zealand Listener.
