Empathy and attitudes: can feeling for a member of a stigmatized group improve feelings toward the group?

Results of 3 experiments suggest that feeling empathy for a member of a stigmatized group can improve attitudes toward the group as a whole. In Experiments 1 and 2, inducing empathy for a young woman with AIDS (Experiment 1) or a homeless man (Experiment 2) led to more positive attitudes toward peop...

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Published inJournal of personality and social psychology Vol. 72; no. 1; p. 105
Main Authors Batson, C D, Polycarpou, M P, Harmon-Jones, E, Imhoff, H J, Mitchener, E C, Bednar, L L, Klein, T R, Highberger, L
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States 01.01.1997
Subjects
Analysis of Variance
Attitude
Empathy
Female
HIV Seropositivity
Homeless Persons
Humans
Male
Minority Groups
Persuasive Communication
Prejudice
Prisoners
Psychological Theory
Social Responsibility
Time Factors
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Summary:Results of 3 experiments suggest that feeling empathy for a member of a stigmatized group can improve attitudes toward the group as a whole. In Experiments 1 and 2, inducing empathy for a young woman with AIDS (Experiment 1) or a homeless man (Experiment 2) led to more positive attitudes toward people with AIDS or toward the homeless, respectively. Experiment 3 tested possible limits of the empathy-attitude effect by inducing empathy toward a member of a highly stigmatized group, convicted murderers, and measuring attitudes toward this group immediately and then 1-2 weeks later. Results provided only weak evidence of improved attitudes toward murderers immediately but strong evidence of improved attitudes 1-2 weeks later.
ISSN:0022-3514
DOI:10.1037/0022-3514.72.1.105