THE HARM OF EMPATHY

“I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear to me; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life…” (Henry David Thoreau)

Kantian transcendentalism and Thoreau’s forest are relics of the past. A historical past, yet separated from our present by the abyss of globalization, where virtuality and technology replace mere chronology. The villages of a not-so-distant past were woven by the spirit of community. These villages have disappeared, becoming unrecognizable and transformed into the developed world through successive waves of progress – the Industrial Revolution, utilitarian and democratic reforms, the golden age of capitalism, the information revolution, and the exodus from postmodern urban centers. Community has been surpassed by technology, and moral consciousness has been destroyed by technocracy. At this moment, the term empathy was first used by E.B. Titchener, a psychologist, around 1900, originating from the Greek word empátheia, which means “to enter into the feeling.”

Theoretically, being empathetic leads people to help each other. It is closely linked to altruism – love and interest in others – and the capacity to help. When an individual can feel the pain or suffering of another by putting themselves in their place, it awakens the desire to help and to act according to moral principles. The ability to put oneself in another’s place, developed through empathy, helps to better understand behavior in certain circumstances and how others make decisions. Within science, empathy has been contextualized and has become a topic of debate in the constitution of the “Theory of Mind” around 1978, when a new discussion began about the ability to attribute mental states – beliefs, intentions, desires, knowledge, etc. – to oneself and others, and to understand that others have beliefs, desires, and intentions that are distinct from one’s own. Empathy is a related concept, meaning the experience of recognizing and understanding the mental states, including beliefs, desires, and particularly emotions of others, often characterized as the ability to “understand another’s perspective.”

It was in the early 20th century that relational attitudes between people began to be of interest for studies. After the end of the First World War, when the United States was becoming the largest economy in the world. Besides car factories, the U.S. was also the largest producer of steel, canned food, machinery, oil, coal, etc. It was at this time that the famous expression “American Way of Life” emerged. The world envied the American lifestyle. From 1920 to 1929, Americans, deluded by this apparent prosperity, began to abandon the countryside and flood the cities, started betting on the stock market, buying various shares in different companies, until on October 24, 1929, the worst economic crisis in the history of capitalism occurred. Many businessmen did not survive the crisis and went bankrupt, as did several banks that lent money but did not receive the loans back and also went bankrupt. The stock market crash brought fear, unemployment, and bankruptcy. Millionaires discovered, overnight, that they had nothing left and because of this, some committed suicide. The number of beggars increased. This terrible crisis that spanned the decade became known as the Great Depression.

At that moment, Dale Carnegie realized that the world was changing, that people’s behavior had to adapt to the economic transformation, fierce competition, high unemployment, and falling sales in all areas. This created the necessity to do things differently; it was then that in 1936, the first self-help book emerged. Carnegie released one of the books that later became one of the world’s greatest self-help best-sellers – “How to Win Friends and Influence People.” A true guide, with models of pseudo patterns of human and social behaviors that served as an empathetic manual with the paradoxical proposal of doing things differently by mastering the art of winning people over. From there, numerous superficial and inconsistent works and studies began to be published with the same purpose, to make the person more interesting in the eyes of others, establishing a kind of normosis, proposing standard rules of human behavior.

Since that time, several social scientists have investigated ways to influence another person’s attitudes and actions. Thirty years ago, at the peak of the flurry of research on emotional intelligence, many self-help manuals and guides on the subject emerged, but effectively few with beneficial, non-speculative content. Researchers were not concerned with effectively studying the effects of empathy through the role of emotions in relationships and negotiations; there were very few studies on how feelings and emotions influence how people overcome conflicts and reach an agreement.

According to psychologist Alison Wood Brooks, negotiation academics focused mainly on strategies and tactics, following their interlinked behavioral manuals solely in pursuit of persuasion. Brooks draws attention when she says that this mainly occurs in how interlocutors identify and consider alternatives, use bargaining chips, and execute the choreography of proposals and counter-proposals. Seeking to establish conviction by adopting a character through tactics to produce a positive way. When experts began to analyze the psychological effects of negotiations, they focused on diffuse and undefined mood states—for example, if participants felt more excited or suspicious and how it affected their behavior.

In the last decade, however, with the help of neuroscience, scientists realized there was something much bigger to be analyzed, and then they began to examine how specific emotions—anger, sadness, disappointment, anxiety, envy, excitement, and regret—can also affect behavior in relationships. They studied the differences between what happens when people simply feel these emotions and when they also demonstrate them to the other party through words or actions. In this way, it became evident that more than an empathetic smile, there is much more to be analyzed when seeking to understand people’s behavior, that the excess and unnecessary use of gestures and expressions can consist of moments that we should not necessarily adopt empathy as a path to achieving desired results.

According to Brooks, when negotiations involve long-term relationship interlocutors, understanding the role of emotions is even more important because in relationships, empathy becomes common between parties, making us blind to observe the whole of a negotiation, favoring errors and misguided and other hasty decisions. Understanding how the other person is feeling is a critical component of emotional intelligence, the act of perceiving verbal and non-verbal language is fundamental in business and to achieve desired results, but when there is an excess of empathy between parties, people lose track and control of observation, creating true unconscious maps, drastically interfering with fundamental purposes.

There is no shortage of books and researches that claim that the habit of being persuasive, of developing the art of empathy, putting yourself in the other’s place and directing attention and care to them; evidently, they all suggest that this is a skill and a great differential, becoming very fruitful whatever the environment. Not implying to be for one or more people, the act of empathy always seems to be favorable and somewhat strategic. However, there are cases, however, where this feeling causes problems and, instead of bringing people closer together, it has the opposite effect, quite harmful.

Excessive empathy can remove the critical being, allowing us to make misguided, tendentious, and omissive decisions. Even if there is no intention to harm others or even the business, being overly empathetic actually creates a sense of debt and loyalty, which is not always useful and beneficial. Empathy is undoubtedly important and of extreme interest, whether inside or outside work; life is made up of affections, relationships in which we live with each other, always. Empathy brings us the being of trust and why not a dose of hope. Workers or not, we create expectations, whether with friends, clients, or suppliers, and therefore, behind this, there is the idea that makes us believe that others will do what we expect them to do, especially when empathetic.

Psychologist Robert B. Cialdini was another major author on this topic. He narrates some scientific studies on the subject and in his article “What Gets You to Say YES,” Cialdini describes a brief guide to escape the trap when one is not capable of effectively balancing empathy, so that it does not become a weapon against oneself or the business itself, for example, due to these empathic inclinations not always helping guide our business transactions, social engagements, and personal relationships consciously. The knowledge and application of the rules proposed by so many imperative authors of empathy propose it as something that enhances our power as citizens; however, if we are not aware of the present moment, we may be harmed by simply acting on the emotion generated by empathy rather than reason.

Robert B. Cialdini describes in his book “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion” the six basic inclinations of human behavior and, of course, categorically describes the importance of empathy in relationships and in the imminent quest to generate a positive response, working on topics such as reciprocity, consistency, social proof, liking (someone), authority, and scarcity.

Empathy has become such a discussed topic in business relationships that it has been categorized as the foundation of behavioral training. Adam Waytz, psychologist and professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, describes in his article, for example, extremes such as those adopted years ago by Ford Motor Company, which began asking its engineers (mostly men) to use the “empathy belly” – a simulator that allows experiencing pregnancy symptoms such as back pain, bladder pressure, weight gain of 14 kilos or more. They could even feel “movements” mimicking fetal kicks. The idea was to make them understand the ergonomic challenges faced by pregnant women while driving, their limited reach, changes in posture, and center of gravity. It is difficult to know if the experience improved Ford’s cars or increased customer satisfaction; however, engineers confessed to benefiting from it. They continue to use the simulated belly, but not only that, they are also simulating blurred vision and joint stiffness of older drivers with an “elderly apparatus.”

These exercises constitute, at minimum, an attempt to “put oneself in another person’s shoes,” in the famous words of Henry Ford, who considered this attitude the key to success.

As a truly necessary skill in all areas, empathy is on the rise virtually everywhere – not only at Ford, and not only in relation to project teams and product development. It lies at the heart of design conception and innovation in its broadest definition, essential in professions that interact directly with people such as marketing and motivational training. It is also praised as a crucial leadership skill that helps influence others within the organization, anticipate stakeholders’ concerns, respond to social media followers, and even conduct better meetings.

However, psychologist Adam Waytz draws attention in his studies and research, demonstrating much of what is presented about empathy, distorting its true need and applicability, and if empathy is not properly balanced, it can trap and harm the business, relationships, negatively influence your team, and deteriorate your leadership capability, despite being essential for leading and managing. Without it, disastrous decisions would be made, and the benefits just described would be sacrificed. Failing to recognize its limits can affect individual and organizational performance.

Adam Waytz describes in his excellent article “The Limits of Empathy” some of the major problems one may encounter:

Problem 1: It is Exhausting

Like heavy cognitive tasks, such as remembering a lot of information at once or avoiding distractions in a busy environment, empathy consumes our mental resources. Thus, jobs that require constant empathy can lead to “compassion fatigue,” a condition of stress and feeling of exhaustion. Healthcare professionals, flight attendants, social workers, and corrections officers are especially at risk, as empathy is central to their work. In a study with nurses in a geriatric clinic, for example, key indicators of compassion fatigue were psychological: anxiety, tension, and what some researchers call excessive empathy, which means the tendency to sacrifice one’s own needs for others’ (rather than simply “feeling” for people). The demand for empathy is also “relentless” in other sectors. Day after day, managers must motivate knowledge workers by understanding their experiences and perspectives, and helping them find personal meaning in their work. Customer service professionals must continually mitigate the concerns of those who seek them out, anxious. On its own, empathy is draining in any context where it is a major aspect of work, and therefore needs to be trained, like any other skill. Empathy not only depletes energy and cognitive resources – it also wears out if the person does not resort to psychological strategies to handle the situation healthily. People who reported spending “some time at work listening to colleagues’ problems and concerns” and helping “those overwhelmed with tasks” felt less able to connect with their own family, were emotionally exhausted, and overwhelmed by work-related demands.

People who reported spending “some time listening to colleagues’ problems and concerns” and helping “those overwhelmed with tasks” in the workplace felt less capable of connecting with their own family, were emotionally exhausted, and burdened by work-related demands.

Problem 2: Zero-Sum Game

Empathy not only depletes energy and cognitive resources – it also exhausts if a person does not resort to psychological strategies to handle the situation healthily. Several psychologists believe that we have a “quantum” of energy, varying from one individual to another. But in most cases, the more empathy is dedicated to a spouse, for example, the less is left to offer to a mother; the more offered to a mother, the less is possible to dispose of to a child. Both our desire to be empathetic and the effort it requires are available in limited quantities, whether we are dealing with family and friends or with clients and colleagues.

Consider this study: researchers examined cases where there were choice conflicts called trade-offs in the corporate world associated with empathic behaviors at work and at home. They followed 844 professionals from various fields, including hairdressers, firefighters, and telemarketers. People who reported spending “some time listening to colleagues’ problems and concerns” and helping “those overwhelmed with tasks” in the workplace felt less capable of connecting with their own family, were emotionally exhausted, and burdened by work-related demands. Sometimes the situation of “one gains, another loses” leads to another type of trade-off. Empathy towards people “inside” – our team or organization – can limit our ability to empathize with people “outside” our immediate circle. Naturally, we devote more time and effort to understanding the needs of close friends and colleagues and simply find it easier to do so, as we care more about them. This unequal investment creates a gap that is widened by our limited stock of empathy. As we consume most of what we have available with “our” people, the bonds with them become stronger, while the desire to connect with those outside dwindles.

Preferential empathy can lead to aggression towards those “inside” compared to those “outside”. For example, in a study conducted with Professor Nicholas Epley of the University of Chicago, we observed how two groups of volunteers – those sitting next to a friend (to foster empathic connection) and those sitting next to a stranger – associated a group they did not identify with, for example, terrorists, with particularly negative ideas. After describing terrorists, we asked to what extent they would support statements portraying them as subhuman, to what extent they would accept subjecting them to drowning, and to what voltages of electric shock they would be willing to administer. Simply sitting in a room with a friend significantly increased people’s willingness to torture and treat others as less than human. While this study represents an extreme case, the same principle applies to organizations. Compassion for our own employees and colleagues sometimes produces aggressive responses towards others. More often, those inside simply have no interest in empathizing with those outside – and this can cause people to reject opportunities for constructive collaboration between functions or organizations.

Problem 3: Ethical Threat

Empathy can also cause lapses in ethical judgment. We saw a bit of this in the study on terrorists. In many cases, however, the problem does not stem from aggression towards outsiders but from extreme loyalty to insiders. By making a concentrated effort to see and feel the same way as those close to us, we may take their interests as our own. Thus, we become more willing to turn a blind eye to transgressions or even behave badly on behalf of our convictions. Numerous studies on decision-making demonstrate that people are more likely to cheat in favor of another. In contexts where benefits are either financial or reputation-related, they rationalize their dishonesty to alleviate someone else’s suffering or empathize with the plight of someone treated unfairly. In the workplace, empathy towards colleagues can inhibit the disclosure of information of public interest – and when this happens, scandals often follow. Just think of situations involving police, military, and religious institutions accused of brutality, sexual abuse, fraud. Generally, allegations are made by outsiders who do not identify with the perpetrators of violence.

In research by Liane Young and James Dungan of Boston College, the effects of loyalty on people using Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, an online marketplace where users earn money by completing tasks, were studied. At the start of the research, some participants were asked to write an essay about loyalty, while others wrote about impartiality.

Later, participants were exposed to poorly performed work by another person. Those incentivized by loyalty were less likely to pay attention to the colleague’s poor performance. This finding complements research showing that bribery is more common in countries that reward collectivism. The sense of belonging and interdependence among group members often leads people to tolerate transgressions, feeling less responsible for errors and dispersing responsibility to the collective whole rather than attributing it to the individual. In short, empathy for those within our immediate circle can obstruct justice for all.

Problem 4: Empathetic Loyalty

I always say that one of the major issues with empathy is precisely consenting to the loyalty of the relationship, and when this happens, we often fail to perceive the context to observe only the parts, becoming empathetic blinds. In common sense, loyalty is presented as a social virtue, fair and good, but history teaches us that this is not always the case, as everything depends on whom and what you are loyal to. Could being loyal to a colleague who is a pedophile, bad, grotesque, disrespectful, dishonest, not signify a virtuous attitude in itself? Loyalty for loyalty’s sake guarantees nothing, no moral value, since it is possible to be loyal and malevolent, loyal and dishonest, loyal and a thief, as long as you are loyal to misguided choices. In a way, loyalty leads, in some way, to acting consistently with the expectations it generated, but coherence between the expectations generated and what one ends up doing is not always welcome; this coherence can demand a biased, malevolent, and condemnable attitude, so it is understood to understand that every empathetic gesture can imply tendentious choices.

It is evident that empathy becomes fundamental for social life. It is practically impossible to imagine a world where empathy is absolutely absent, where apathy is the absolute rule. If you think like this for a few minutes, you will soon realize that living together becomes absolutely impossible when there is only apathy. In a way, human nature expects not to disappoint people with whom one has some kind of relationship; thus, empathy becomes representative in common sense as something positive, a moral virtue, thus being a facilitating tool for social coexistence. However, when talking about empathy, one is also talking about a relationship, and relationships are based on the ethical sense of good conduct for healthy relational harmonization, which often end up confusing, establishing beyond coexistence and respect also the loyalty of the parties, and not always does loyalty have its positive contemplation, so it is fundamental to reflect on empathy in a more complex way, so that it is possible to understand all the results that can be achieved.

The problems presented may seem difficult to address, but it is possible to mitigate them within groups and organizations. Adam Waytz suggests that people divide the work. According to him, the good news is that compassion can be trained – and expanded. In a company, for example, an interesting exercise is to ask each employee to initially focus on a few people to train empathy, instead of doing it in a generalized way. Some people may first turn their attention to clients and others to colleagues – a kind of task force to meet different needs. Gradually, it is possible to consciously increase the size of the groups for which each one is “responsible” for “caring”. The idea is to gradually extend empathetic capacity, avoiding creating isolated groups.

Adam Waytz also proposes that Empathy not be a sacrifice. The human mind is capable of both intensifying and decreasing our susceptibility to empathy overload. For example, we exacerbate the problem of “one wins, another loses” when we assume that our own interests and those of others are fundamentally opposed. This often happens in negotiations where parties with different positions do not move because they are obsessed with the gap between them. Viewing the other as an adversary – or worse, as an enemy – not only prevents us from understanding and responding to the other party but also makes us feel as if we have “lost” when we fail to get something our way. We can avoid burnout by seeking integrative solutions that serve the interests of both sides. But for this, concessions are necessary.

Give people periods of rest. Adam Waytz, as a professor of management and organizations, finds it somewhat uncomfortable when students refer to department courses on leadership, teams, and negotiation as “subtle skills.” Understanding and responding to the needs, interests, and desires of other human beings involves one of the hardest jobs there is. Despite empathy being said to come naturally, it takes intense mental effort to understand another person—and then respond with compassion rather than indifference. Generally, we know that people need periodic relief from work, whether it’s analytical, technical, or repetitive tasks like data entry. The same goes for empathy. Simply encouraging self-directed projects that benefit groups (and often result in more work), as Google did with its 20% free time policy for employees, isn’t enough.

It can be highly productive and healthy to encourage individuals to spend time focusing solely on their interests. Recent research has found that people who take multiple breaks for rest—and use these periods to pursue their own interests—later report feeling more empathy towards others. In other words, when people feel restored, they are better able to tackle difficult tasks and respond to others’ needs. Based on this, some companies are investing in isolation chambers, such as Orrb Technologies’ “well-being and learning pods,” where people can literally enter a bubble to relax, meditate, or engage in activities that help recharge their energy. Other companies, like electrical component distributor Van Meter, implement simpler interventions, such as closing employees’ email accounts during vacations to allow them to focus on themselves without interruptions.

There’s no denying that dealing with people and living with them healthily is an art, and empathy is essential for good relational living. Well-being is interconnected with social interaction, being useful to others, and feeling useful is one of life’s greatest rewards. However, it’s crucial to have control over oneself and one’s actions. We cannot allow ourselves to be dominated by others; remember, we are responsible for our actions and the outcomes of those actions. If Aristotle were alive today, I believe he would be an enthusiastic advocate of “philautia” as a necessary basis for empathetic understanding, believing that people who don’t feel good about themselves or harbor a degree of self-aversion will struggle to relate to the feelings, needs, and worldviews of others. If you want to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, you need to feel comfortable in your own; therefore, above all, we need to explore how we can become discerning in our choices, observe, perceive, and understand that beyond the moment lies each person’s intentions. Only then, much more than being connected, will we be safeguarded without running the risk of becoming victims of our own empathy.

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Hello, I’m Marcello de Souza! I started my career in 1997 as a leader and manager in a large company in the IT and Telecommunications market. Since then, I have participated in important projects of structuring, implementation, and optimization of telecommunications networks in Brazil. Restless and passionate about behavioral and social psychology. In 2008, I decided to delve into the universe of the human mind.

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