1 / 1

Gender Differences in Empathy Linda Rueckert and Noemi Oyola Northeastern Illinois University

Gender Differences in Empathy Linda Rueckert and Noemi Oyola Northeastern Illinois University. Abstract. Insert your information here. Materials.

hagop
Download Presentation

Gender Differences in Empathy Linda Rueckert and Noemi Oyola Northeastern Illinois University

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Gender Differences in EmpathyLinda Rueckert and Noemi Oyola Northeastern Illinois University Abstract Insert your information here Materials • Empathy was measured with the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI; Davis, 1983), which consists of 28 statements to be rated on a 5-point Likert scale. It can be broken down into four 7-item subscales: • Empathic Concern (EC): concern and sympathy for other people (emotional empathy). • Perspective-Taking (PT): understanding the point of view of others (cognitive empathy). • Fantasy (FS): physiological arousal to a filmed depiction of fictitious characters in movies, plays and books. • Personal Distress (PD) feelings of personal anxiety in reaction to the emotions of . • Right hemisphere activation was measured using the Levy Chimeric Faces Task (LCFT; Levy et al., 1983). It consists of 36 pairs of chimeric faces (see Fig. 1). • Participants were asked to determine whether the top or bottom chimera appeared happier. A “laterality quotient” (LQ) was computed by subtracting the number of smile-left choices from the number of smile-right choices, and dividing by the total: (R-L)/36. A negative LQ indicates a leftward bias (and thus greater activation of the RH), and a positive number indicates a rightward bias (left hemisphere activation). • Numerous previous studies have shown that right-handers exhibit a significant leftward bias that does not differ between men and women (e.g. Levy et al., 1983; Rueckert & Naybar, 2008). The purpose of this study was to examine gender differences in empathy, and whether they may be related to differences in brain asymmetry. Women scored higher than men on all empathy scales, but especially on the emotional empathy scale. For men, cognitive empathy correlated with activation of the left hemisphere. Figure 2. Empathy subscale scores for men and women. Introduction Discussion Figure 1. Item from the Levy Chimeric Faces Task Numerous previous studies have found women score higher in self-reported empathy than men (Eisenberg & Lennon, 1983). Rueckert and Naybar (2008) found that empathy correlated with activation of the right cerebral hemisphere (RH) for women, but not for men. The purpose of the present study was to clarify the results reported by Rueckert & Naybar by using a different measure of empathy which includes separate scales for Empathic Concern (emotional empathy), Perspective Taking (cognitive empathy), Fantasy, and Personal Distress (Davis, 1983). As expected, based on previous studies, there was a significant leftward bias on the LCFT, which did not differ by gender, and women scored higher than men on the IRI. There was also a gender by subscale interaction due to a greater gender difference on the EC subscale. In contrast to the Rueckert and Naybar (2008) study, we did not find a negative correlation between empathy and the LCFT. Instead, we found a significant positive correlation between the LCFT and the EC subscale for men only. This suggests that, for men, activation of the left cerebral hemisphere is related to greater cognitive empathy, which is similar to “theory of mind”. Results • As expected, both men and women showed a significant leftward bias on the LCFT, indicating RH activation (mean LQ = -.352, p = .000). • Women scored higher than men on all subscales of the empathy test. The gender difference was significantly greater for emotional empathy (Fig. 2). • Although women showed the expected negative correlation between LQ and all empathy subscales, none of the correlations were significant. • Men showed an significant positive correlation between LQ and PT (cognitive empathy), indicating that men with greater left hemisphere activation showed greater cognitive empathy, r = .31, p = .04. Participants References Davis, M. H. (1983). Measuring individual differences in empathy: Evidence for a multidimensional approach. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44, 113-126. Eisenberg, N. & Lennon, R. (1983). Sex differences in empathy and related capacities. Psychological Bulletin 94, 100-131. Levy, J., Heller, W., Banich, M.T., & Burton, L.A. (1983). Asymmetry of perception in free viewing of chimeric faces. Brain and Cognition, 2, 404-419. Rueckert, L. & Naybar, N. (2008). Gender differences in empathy: The role of the right hemisphere. Brain and Cognition. Participants were 57 right-handed women and 43 men.

More Related