Empathy present and future

Abstract

The empathy concept has central significance for social and personality psychology and in many other domains, including neuroscience, clinical/abnormal psychology, and the health professions. However, the current diversity in conceptual and operational definitions, and the promiscuous use of the term "empathy," threaten the ability of researchers to advance the field. The present article provides a quantitative review and conceptual analysis of empathy definitions and usages by examining 393 studies published between 2001 and 2013, and 96 studies published in 2017. We document the prevalence and diversity of definitions, as well as inconsistencies between conceptual definitions and measurements employed. We discuss ways to refine the conceptualization and operationalization of the empathy construct, including for many purposes, bypassing the term empathy in favor of lower-level construct labels that more precisely describe what is actually being measured. In many cases we see no added theoretical or empirical value in applying the term empathy.

Keywords: Empathy; meta-analysis; review.