If we did not make judgments of what other people know, how they feel, and what they are likely to do in specific situations, communication would be impossible. Writers have to gauge their expositions to the level of relevant background knowledge expected of their intended audiences. Speakers in everyday conversation must make assumptions about what the other parties to the conversation do and do not know in order to ensure that what they say will be understood.
by Raymond S. Nickerson, Susan F. Butler and Michael Carlin
in The Social Neuroscience of Empathy
by Jean Decety and William Ickes
Empathy refers to shared or vicarious feeling, the ability to imagine oneself in the other’s situation and to experience the emotions that he/she is experiencing. The concept of empathy also has a more cognitive aspect due to the fact that it involves participating in another’s feelings or ideas. This chapter examines how people form beliefs about what others feel and know and whether one’s ability to empathize is based, at least in part, on the other’s tendency to project to someone his/her own feelings and knowledge. It first explains the importance in communication of judging what others know, how they feel, and what they are likely to do in specific situations. It then considers the ability to project oneself to others and the phenomenon known as reflection, which is projection in reverse. It also explores the limits of projection and the naturalness of empathy.
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It seems the most natural thing in the world to attempt to put oneself—emotionally or mentally—in the place of another person, to try to imagine what the other is feeling or thinking. Not only do we often intentionally attempt to imagine what may be in another person’s mind, we also impute knowledge and feelings to people without being conscious of doing so. Much of the common ground that plays a critical role in communication— whether by shaping utterances, as the audience-design hypothesis contends, or by correcting errors of comprehension, as the monitoring-and-adjustment hypothesis claims—is tacit and probably not even consciously recognized as instrumental unless brought to one’s attention.