Showing posts with label Empathy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Empathy. Show all posts

The Self-Protection Hypothesis


None of us are keen on bullies and we empathize with the bullied and try and console them. At least that’s what we see in an ideal world. Things don’t always work out like that and the subject of the bullying may subsequently strike out at some innocent bystander.

This behavior is not restricted to kids in a playground, but occurs with non-human primates such as apes and monkeys. The question of the moment is what is going on in the mind of the sympathetic bystander? Just empathy or what? Schino and Marini in the latest issue of PLoS ONE have watched a large group of mandrills and logged the behavior in post-aggression situations (1).

Mandrills are not widely known for showing lots of empathy, but one never knows. The study showed that after a higher-ranking adult was aggressive to a monkey, some bystanders would show consolation behavior.

After a great deal of watching it seems that empathy was not the main reason, neither was it the action of peacemakers related to the aggressor. The main reason was to avoid the subject of the aggression passing this on to the bystanders.

Those most likely to show the sympathy were the ones most likely to be the subject of the ire of the original victim. That is, the response is best understood in terms of the self-protection hypothesis that suggests that if you show some empathy, you won’t be bullied in turn. I guess that’s a wise move, especially if you find yourself at the wrong end of the pecking order.

  1. http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0038936


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One Good Yawn Deserves Another


Empathy is something that is of current interest among those who are interested in animal behavior, whether it’s people or parrots. One of the ways that is used to assess empathy is to watch for one subject to parrot another.

The latest excitement to hit the streets is Miller et al’s study on yawning parrots parroting each other (1). In this case the flock of captive budgerigars were video taped in the morning, after lunch, and in the evening.

Now it turns out that budgerigars sitting in jail without a lot to do yawn a lot. They also do a lot of stretching of a wing or a leg. The paper mentions that sometimes they stretch both legs, but didn’t make it clear if that was at the same time or sequentially.

Because they yawn and stretch at any time during the day, the impulse can’t be controlled by their circadian clocks telling them it’s time for bed. However, if one budgie yawns, its neighbors quickly follow suit and we see the yawn and stretch flowing through the flock like a Mexican wave.

Yawning contagion seems to be widespread among primates (human or not), rodentia and now parrots. Tortoises, though, are not too bothered if you yawn or not (2). They quietly go about their business chomping on leaves while those around them are yawning or stretching, not caring if they are being polite or not.


  1. M.L. Miller, A.C. Gallup, A.R. Vogel, S.H. Vicario & A.B. Clark, Behavioural Processes, 89, 264, (2012).
  2. http://james-goodwin.blogspot.com/2011/05/tiring-day.html



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There, There, Never Mind.


Yesterday’s post mentioned the rapid visual assessment of “attractiveness” from still or video images. Rapid assessment of an individual's mood is an important facility for our survival as well as our happiness. Reading body language is a skill that is deeply embedded in our past development, even though our more cerebral evaluations make us doubt our “instincts.” On the other hand, our dog is very sharp at reading the signals and if it growls, maybe we should listen.

The most recent variant on the instant assessment front is covered in a BBC report of a study in the Proceedings of The National Academy of Science by Kogan et al (1,2).  Here their “lab rats” watched silent movies of 23 couples. The main movie had one half of a couple telling the other about their hard times and the lab rats were allowed to watch for a generous 20 seconds after which they came up with a score for prosocial tendencies.

So far, so good, but where’s the real test here? Well, the film stars had their DNA laid bare. Specifically their OXTR (oxytocin receptor0r) gene, or at least parts of it. The G or A alleles of the gene were the focus. The BBC has called it the cuddle chemical (1) so the researchers are matching up the allele combinations with the perceived empathic estimates.

The top rated empathizers all had a pair of G’s, so GG means you’re one of the good guys. An AA or AG combo means, well, maybe you’re not a good listener and won’t offer a handkerchief and a cuddle, but more likely pithy advice like “get over it”.

It’s a rather scary thought that a glance at your facial expression lays bare parts of your genetic make up like it’s been tattooed on your forehead. I wonder what other behavioral/gene/body language patterns will show up next?

  1. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-15693508
  2. http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2011/11/08/1112658108

Ouch!


Empathy for our fellow person's condition is something that we should all cultivate, but how far down the road will we travel? Not many as far as Sidney carton in “Tale Of Two Cities” as he heads off to the guillotine (sorry, but some puns are just irresistible) with the phrase “it’s a far, far better thing that I do now …..” and leaves Darnay free to lose his head over his wife, Lucie.

Us lesser mortals can do our bit though, given the opportunity. Grit et al used increases in skin conductance as a measure of empathy when a group of young women saw each other getting electric shocks (1). Young women were chosen so as not to bring the complicating factor of gender into the discussion. It seems that they may only have half the story, but perhaps they’ll extend the work to young men and get some shocking results.

The participants were each subjected to electric shocks ranging in pain levels from very mild to ouch!! The magnitude was displayed on a computer screen as a visual to any observer. The skin conductance of observers was measured to give an empathy strength reading. The more severe things looked, the sweatier the observers became

So far, so good. Nothing surprising, but this was just the baseline. The interesting experiment came when the observers could do a Sidney Carton, and offer to take the shock themselves and relieve the burden on the subject.

Two interesting finding turned up. The first is that those who showed more empathy were more likely to step up and volunteer to “take one for the team.” When shocked, the participants skin conductance increased, but the smaller the difference between the skin conductance between them being shocked and watching someone else suffering was a good predictor of their volunteering do a Carton.

These guys really need to do the same experiment with men and then with people from an older age group. Do empathic tendencies increase with age?

  1. http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0022759

Shocking Behavior

One of the characteristics that many of us are proud of as humans, and would say that it is an essential prerequisite for a civilized society, is our predisposition for empathy or emotional contagion. So if we witness something unpleasant happening to someone else we have an emotional response. The level, of course, may depend on exactly what is happening to whom. This characteristic is important for such things as bringing up our children, interacting with customers and most of our social interactions.

We learn as babies to cry if we hear others cry and we carry on with this emotional contagion when, as kids, we scare each other with ghost stories or, as adults, when we panic buy when he hear that there is a shortage of some commodity.

Genuine empathy, though, goes somewhat deeper so that we understand the causes of our emotion and prosocial behavior results. Currently, the neuroscientists are still at the guessing stage in understanding how these responses are differentiating in the brain.

But before we become too smug about the proclivities of our species, we should be aware that mice and rats are also empathic beings. Atsak et al have presented a study showing this with rats (1).

If a rat wandering about in a cage gets an electric shock to its feet, it does two things. It gives an ultrasonic squeak and it freezes waiting to see what will happen next. Now, a rat witness to this event will also freeze if they have had a foot shock in their past lives. Ones who haven’t, wonder what all the fuss is about.

Things become more interesting. Once the victim sees its neighbor freezing with it, it freezes for longer. Just as we make more of an event when someone shows lots of sympathy. With the rats the squeaking didn’t do much. Experienced witnesses took no notice when recorded squeaks were played back, indicating that they were being empathic when they vicariously froze and weren’t showing emotional contagion.

We should keep this understanding of empathy in mind with our dealings with other animals as it’s a safe bet that empathy goes broader than people, rats and mice.


  1. http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0021855