CHECK Magazin - Gesundheitsmagazin für Männer No.15

CHECK MAG #15
Forms of empathy
Emotional empathy
Being able to feel what other people feel.
Cognitive empathy
Understanding the thoughts and intentions
of others and being able to draw conclusions
about their behaviour.
Social empathy
Being able to understand social behaviour,
for example in families, teams, companies,
LGBTIQAA* communities.
You get to my age!
Digitalisation brings us new faces and stories every
day, which the brain cannot process emotionally
because of the quantity. So in order to continue
consuming, the emotions have to be “switched
off”. This leads to alienation, because although
one hears and sees the emotions of others, one no
longer feels them. Apathy sets in, which anyone
who has taken the U2 in the morning can confirm:
mobile phone or not, when it gets too crowded,
most people go into zombie mode.
According to one study, age has no general
influence on the ability to empathise with others,
but with increasing age there is a demonstrable
decrease in emphatic readiness, and this
often occurs when the outside world is not seen as
relevant to the elderly. 2
The four pillars of empathy
Professionals use these terms,
among others, for training empathy:
Perception
How are the others?
Gestures, facial expressions,
body language, statements,
voice, emotions
Resonance
How do we react?
Consideration, words, action,
compassion, acceptance
Understanding
Why are they feeling this way?
Motives, causes,
circumstances
Anticipation
How will others continue to react?
Emotionally,
rationally
The frontal lobe (prefrontal cortex)
performs higher cognitive functions such as
language, memory, problem solving and
judgement. It also plays a major role in the
expression of emotions. In humans, it is not
fully mature until around the age of 25.
The language of the heart
The trend study “Youth in Germany – 2023 with
Generation Comparison” 3 asked different age
groups (Baby Boomers, Millennials, Gen Z) about
their values. It was concluded that there are no
major differences between the generations: family,
health and freedom are of the highest importance
for all groups. If everyone finds the same things
important, then why is there so much conflict?
This may be because not everyone is emphatic to
the same and healthy degree. One study found that
sexual orientation is related to the degree
of empathy: based on self-report, heterosexual
women showed the highest level of empathy,
followed by gay men, then lesbian women and
finally heterosexual men. 4 A similar picture
emerged from the analysis of brain activity that
was also carried out: the area of the TPJ (Temporal
Parietal Junction – temporal and lateral part of the
head), which is related to the perception of other
brain areas, was more active in subjects who felt
attracted to men than in those who felt attracted
to women.
The older lady walking slowly in front of you
doesn’t care if you have to go somewhere fast.
Instead of recognising and thus understanding the
reasons for the slow walking via the brain regions
with mirror properties, stress and aggression arise
because the slow movements of the old lady are
not perceived emphatically. A direct, friendly word
in everyday life may therefore help everyone here,
leading to less apathy and alienation.
1
1 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1070311
2 https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/197225532/ergebnisse [n.d.]
3 https://simon-schnetzer.com/jugend-in-deutschland-2023-mit-generationenvergleich/
4 https://www.newswise.com/articles/empathy-is-related-to-sexualorientation
[n.d.].
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