Finding Empathy: How Neuroscientific Measures, Evidence and Conceptualizations Interact

International Journal of Philosophical Studies 27 (2):224-243 (2019)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

ABSTRACTQuestions about how empathy should be conceptualized have long been a preoccupation of the field of empathy research. There are numerous definitions of empathy that have been proposed and that often overlap with other concepts such as sympathy and compassion. This makes communication between research groups or across disciplines difficult. Many researchers seem to see the diversity of definitions as a problem rather than a form of benign pluralism. Within this debate about conceptualization, researchers sometimes suggest that more neuroscientific evidence will make the problem go away – that uncovering the processes underlying empathy will thereby also sort out conceptual difficulties. In this paper, I challenge this assumption by examining how neuroscientists studying empathy use concepts in practice – both in the development of their measures and in the interpretation of their data. I argue that this neuroscientific literature demonstrates that continuity and stability comes from the use of cert...

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,593

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Beyond Empathy for Pain.Frédérique de Vignemont & Pierre Jacob - 2016 - Philosophy of Science 83 (3):434-445.
Mice in the Sink.Jessica Pierce - 2008 - Environmental Philosophy 5 (1):75-96.
Rejecting Empathy for Animal Ethics.T. J. Kasperbauer - 2015 - Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 18 (4):817-833.
Mice in the Sink.Jessica Pierce - 2008 - Environmental Philosophy 5 (1):75-96.
Historical Empathy in the Social Studies Classroom.Sarah Brooks - 2009 - Journal of Social Studies Research 33 (2):213-234.

Analytics

Added to PP
2019-04-15

Downloads
18 (#711,533)

6 months
1 (#1,040,386)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Riana Betzler
Washington University in St. Louis

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

Empathy: Its ultimate and proximate bases.Stephanie D. Preston & Frans B. M. de Waal - 2001 - Behavioral and Brain Sciences 25 (1):1-20.
The empathic brain: how, when and why?Frederique de Vignemont & Tania Singer - 2006 - Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10 (10):435-441.
Understanding empathy.Amy Coplan - 2011 - In Amy Coplan & Peter Goldie (eds.), Empathy: Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives. Oxford University Press. pp. 3--18.
Is Construct Validation Valid?Anna Alexandrova & Daniel M. Haybron - 2016 - Philosophy of Science 83 (5):1098-1109.
The Concept of Validity.Denny Borsboom, Gideon J. Mellenbergh & Jaap van Heerden - 2004 - Psychological Review 111 (4):1061-1071.

View all 7 references / Add more references