Influence of self-reported distress and empathy on egoistic versus altruistic motivation to help.

Abstract

The authors propose that a distinction should be made between two different emotional responses to seeing another person suffer-personal distress and empathy. Moreover, they propose that these different emotions lead to two different kinds of motivation to help: Personal distress leads to egoistic motivation; empathy, to altruistic motivation. Three studies were conducted to assess the value of these distinctions. Across the three studies, factor analysis of subjects' selfreported emotional response indicated that feelings of personal distress and empathy, although positively correlated, were experienced as qualitatively distinct. Moreover, the pattern of helping in Studies 1 and 2 indicated that a predominance of personal distress led to egoistic motivation, whereas a predominance of empathy led to altruistic motivation. Results of Study 3, in which the cost of helping was made especially high, suggested an important qualification on the link between empathic emotion and altruistic motivation. In that study, subjects reporting a predominance of empathy displayed an egoistic pattern of helping. Apparently, making helping very costly evoked self-concern, which overrode any altruistic impulse produced by feeling empathy.

The emotional dog and its rational tail: A social intuitionist approach to moral judgment.

“…Batson and his colleagues have developed the "empathy-altruism hypothesis," which states that empathy aroused by the perception of someone's suffering evokes an altruistic motivation directed toward the ultimate goal of reducing the suffering (Batson, 1987;see also Hoffman, 1982). Batson, O'Quinn, Fulty, Vanderplass, and Isen (1983) found that participants who experienced empathy while watching a woman receiving (fake) electric shocks generally volunteered to take the shocks in her place, even when they were given the option of leaving the scene. Participants who experienced only nonempathic personal distress about the woman's plight volunteered to trade places with her only when they thought they would have to continue watching the woman receive the shocks.…”

Depression Proneness and Reactions to a Depressive Stimulus

“…Communication Emotional Response Scale (CERS; Batson, O'Quin, Fultz, Vanderplas, & Isen, 1983). The CERS is a 14-item measure of empathic and distressed reactions elicited by the target stimulus.…”

Investigating the Utility of the Film War Zone as a Component of a Street Harassment Prevention Program

“…Baston, O'Quin, Fultz, Vanderplas, and Isen (1983) postulate that people may experience one of two emotions as a consequence of witnessing a person's suffering; one emotion characterized by feelings of distress and the other characterized by sympathy for the other person. In this view, only the sympathy for the other person is considered empathy.…”

“…To compute the scales, items are summed together and divided by the number of items. Baston et al (1983) examined the structure of the ERQ using factor analysis and found that for 88 female and male undergraduate students (race/ethnicity unreported), the 14 items loaded onto the expected subscale. Further, they found that type of emotional response (personal distress versus empathy) was related to participants' behavior (egoistic or altruistic) in the expected direction.…”

“…Response Questionnaire (ERQ; Baston et al, 1983). The ERQ measures two distinct affective reactions to witnessing another person's suffering; distress (alarmed, grieved, upset, worried, disturbed, perturbed, distressed, troubled) and empathy (sympathetic, moved, compassionate, tender, warm, softhearted).…”