Are We Losing Our Empathy?

http://www.care2.com/greenliving/are-we-losing-our-empathy.html

posted by Ann Pietrangelo May 31, 2010 5:05 pm

College students today are less empathetic than college students of the past. At least that’s what University of Michigan researchers have concluded.

The meta-analysis combined the results of 72 different studies of American college students that were conducted between 1979 and 2009 and involved 14,000 students. Today’s students were found to possess about 40 percent less empathy than students of 20 or 30 years ago, with the biggest drop coming after the year 2000.

Who or what is to blame for the apparent loss of empathy? After all, the study participants are the offspring of those more empathetic college kids from the 70’s and 80’s.

There are plenty of theories as to the cause. Violence on television, in the movies, and in video games has desensitized us to the plight of others; online social networking encourages an “all about Me” attitude; texting and virtual friendships have pulled us further apart rather than closer together; a generation raised with an overabundance of “you are special” affirmations. Maybe none of these theories explains it; maybe all of them do.

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The president took a lot of heat for that statement, as if empathy makes one weak or unable to make a fair judgment. But empathy is not about weakness; it is about strength and intelligence.

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