The Neuroscience of Compassion and Empathy and Their Link to Prosocial Motivation and Behavior

Abstract

Empathy enables us to connect with one another at an emotional level. However, this might not be enough to promote prosociality. For instance, it has often been argued that empathically suffering with others does not necessarily motivate us to help them, neither conceptually nor empirically. To fill this gap, a tradition in psychology has highlighted the role of empathic concern or compassion, and developments in social neuroscience have made this proposal increasingly clear. Indeed, empathy and compassion have been shown to tap on dissociable neurobiological mechanisms, as well as on different affective and motivational states. More specifically, while empathy for pain engages a network of brain areas centered around the anterior insula and anterior midcingulate cortex, areas associated with negative affect, compassionate states have been associated with activity in the medial orbitofrontal cortex and ventral striatum, and come with feelings of warmth, concern, and positive affect. Most intriguingly, much like any motor ability, it has also been shown that empathy and compassion can be trained; whereby compassion training has been associated with a number of intrapersonal and interpersonal benefits, ranging from increases in psychological well-being and health to increased cooperation, trust, and tolerance.