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2025-09-02 - Defining Empathy | Otter.ai

2025-09-02 - Defining Empathy

Edwin Rutsch1h 1min

Edwin Rutsch

00:00

All's gonna hit the AI, so we've been meeting, you know, exploring that, the empathy definition project, and been creating those presentations. And, yeah, so I don't know you want to introduce yourself and just your interest, Natasha, what, what your interest in empathy definition so forth is,

Speaker 1

00:27

yeah, I'd love to, yeah. I live in Austin, Texas, and I've been participating online empathy circles, mostly with Larry and Madeline's group, which was happening Mondays in the afternoon that was centered around red, blue politics. I started attending that right around the election last year, November, I believe maybe October. And I've been going about maybe twice a month on average. And I've explored a few other empathy circles hosted by other people more recently, and and then last Saturday, I was functioning as the facilitator of a different virtual online community in which I employed the use of it in empathy circle format, Which worked out really fantastic. Everybody loved it. And 85% on the empathy or Empath scale from what I tested in the past, like 8590 and, yeah, I mean, I just feel there's a lot of points of interest, I say, encompassed in this for me. I mean, I've also been taking some online courses in psychology this past nine months, and I have a way of being by Carl Rogers on my table next to me, and I've been enjoying some of his work. And, yeah, and it was really, I sent you an email like a couple hours ago, where I don't know if you had a chance to see it, but, but I just mentioned how I one of the full hour discussions I caught by you in the past week was It was between you and someone named Kevin, I think, and they were talking about,

Edwin Rutsch

02:44

hey, they're critic of empathy, right?

Speaker 1

02:48

Yeah, nominally, that's the way you sort of started the talk, where you were the advocate, he was the critic. But it very quickly felt like there was a lot more convergence between you two on what was actually being looked at. I noticed that was sort of my takeaway. At least I didn't get the sense that you ended it or even by the middle. It didn't feel like YouTuber at odds all that much. It did feel like he had his points to make and his you know, the thing that he was emphasizing and but he seems very open to your framing of empathy, from what I recall, and I was just checking out something else, yeah, I guess, like last week's meeting, defining empathy projects and the relationship between the Drama Triangle. I found that very interesting, and I read the email you put out last night to you with the eight different definitions of empathy. So yeah, it definitely feels like something I'm very interested in, and I've been very active in for the last year. And then there's another type of circling that I'm also very interested in. So I find it interesting how there are these two not quite parallel forms of circling that are kind of spreading to a communication between people, maybe ways that are synergistic, but not necessarily convergent. From what I've observed, I'm not sure if you're familiar with the practice of circling as it's

Edwin Rutsch

04:24

kind of more, there's another process just to bring Jodi that it's, it's sort of, it's a dialog sort of process, but someone shares, and then people respond in terms of how, I think it's like, how, What was the impact of of the other person on you? Is that kind of it? Would you say, encircling that you you're speaking about the other person, the impact that they had on you is that? Would you say that if,

Speaker 1

04:55

well, I would say that's one potential component of. Of circling, circling itself, I think is very orthogonal, maybe, to your entity, circle idea. And I've just sort of blown over the fact. I just want to express gratitude to you, Edwin, for ushering this into the world. I mean, you're the mother of this practice, and father and in between. And I really appreciate you know, you offering this because it's had a big impact on me and so many people. But, but just to say, my definition of circling, like just from a objective perspective, I think there is no definition of circling that makes that's coherent to me there, it's more of like a permissive space for people to just be with each other and explore communication in ways that would be utterly impossible otherwise, but I but. But then there's different communities that different denominations, if you will. Of circling that, I'm not aware of all of them. There's one that's there's been a few based out of Austin over the past decade that I've been involved with off and on and and honestly, I've had pretty severe ruptures from and with in between multiple times, simply because it doesn't, it's, it's really the opposite of what you're doing. Like, it doesn't have any structure. Like, I sort of define it as being ruled metaphorically by some kind of chaos goddess, or something like this. Well, let me before

Edwin Rutsch

06:37

you get too far into the circling, yeah, I want to kind of give you a framework here. So we had had sort of an open, you know, exploration. We had a couple people come into the group, and then, you know, they so kind of whittled down to Jody and I, you know, kind of working on this, and we've been very focused on the definition of empathy. And it's, sort of, it's a very, I would say, academic, you know, it really helps to have a lot of academic having read all the literature and sort of understood the understand the literature and the issues you know within, you know, within the academic world, as well as you know, lay world, like how people are defining empathy, and so we're trying to really kind of keep focused on the definition project part of this. And so I thought you could just, you know, kind of take part and see how it kind of works, how, if it seems like there's a fit, like, you know, if it's just just kind of check it out and just see and Jody, you know, you want to check in, like, you know, how are you with a little bit about yourself and what you think about the what we've been doing? Maybe,

Jodie Jenson

07:53

yeah, so it's interesting how we both were kind of independently working on this same kind of topic, and then when we met, it was like, Oh, well, we should be working on this together. So I am working on a PhD in Social Psychology at Brigham Young University in Utah, and I am, I've long since been really interested in empathy. I actually wrote a book about emotional intelligence a few years ago, and kind of from the perspective of parenting, because I have kids at home, and so I was like actively trying to understand how I can better parent my children and help them to learn emotional intelligence. And the part of emotional intelligence that really stood out the most to me was empathy. So I got deeper and deeper and deeper into it, and that led me to want to go back to school and get a PhD. And as I get deeper into the study of empathy, I am realizing, just like Batson says in the in the article that we read, that it is a really interesting and complex topic. And so as we've been working through this over the last, what, eight months or so, we've been trying to come up with a coherent understanding of how we define empathy, and it may, may or may not be the same as the way other people define it. But what's important is specifically looking at it from an academic perspective, a problem comes in when you don't have a clear definition of what you're talking about, and when you don't have a clear definition, and then you use a scale, for example, like in your academic research, to measure empathy. If that doesn't align with your own definition, that's kind of nebulous. Then you're actually not studying the thing that you think you're studying. And so regardless of the myriad ways that people define the term we're trying to understand, like, what is the way that it can be defined within the context of the empathy circle? And so. So that's kind of what we've been working on. And we're trying to work toward maybe coming up with a training that can be used, like within the empathy circle communities, to help people better understand what it is that we're talking about when we say empathy. What does that actually mean to us?

Edwin Rutsch

10:16

Yeah, and the actual what I've been working on is the presentations. I think I sent those to you. It's one is, what is the empathy? What is the empathy, the holistic empathy model? And there's a whole presentation on that, and I keep refining it so there's, what is the the the holistic empathy model. I talked some about the criticisms of empathy with the goal of being able to address those criticisms. And that's what the video with Kevin was kind of about. Was, here's someone who's critical of empathy. You know, he's like talking about radical empathy. He's seeing it as sort of the political left is using it, let's say the woke, far woke left is using it as a gateway practice to recruit people into activism. And he's critical of that. So by having a very clear definition of it, I was able to talk to him, and actually, you know, kind of come up with some real connection and, and there's a lot of criticisms. If you've seen the video, you there's a lot of different criticisms. You know, books coming out, the sin of empathy, toxic empathy, you know, suicidal empathy. All these criticisms are coming out and and I think it's just that we're talking past each other. We're talking about different different things and having a clear definition that we can explain to people, I think we can actually come to Common Ground. I'm very hopeful, you know, and I've seen it too, because we've, we've held empathy circles with the political left and right that rallies, and it's what you bring them into the empathy circle, you know, and people you know really kind of just hear each other and connect. And I think we can bridge divides. So there's that part, there's addressing the conflict. So we're going to go through, using the model and address a lot of the conflict. And I started that Drama Triangle framework for because a lot of the conflicts, I think can fit into the Drama Triangle model. And then we can show how that the empathy circle is the exit to the Drama Triangle. So that's another piece. And then I sent out that I thought one of the that paper by Dan Batson, I'd like to take that and then map that over to the holistic empathy circle model to any and he has some. And so how do we, you know, create a presentation, you know, with that, and then go into the longer term is, you know, addressing the like, the sin of empathy, the toxic empathy, you know, creating responses to those and, and. And also, we're really trying to build a movement, an empathy movement. And, you know, we need a clear definition. So I think this is part of that. Yeah, I don't. So how does all that sort of, and it's also like, how do we find a workflow, too, we want to be productive, and not just be, you know, talking about things, but actually kind of get productive things, get presentations created, and so forth. So indeed,

Jodie Jenson

13:46

that has been one of our hard sites.

Edwin Rutsch

13:48

We do end up talking a lot.

Jodie Jenson

13:52

We philosophize a lot, so yeah,

Edwin Rutsch

13:54

but it helps with getting clarity and stuff, yeah. So,

Speaker 1

13:57

Well, I'm glad you're recording these talks. I mean, I think AI is one of the things it's best at now is, you know, sifting through large, you know, data sets of recorded audio or text and, you know, getting whatever you want out of it, refined or filtered or summarized. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I resonate with everything you just said, and I think I'm familiar with most of the things you're describing. I mean, like, I just like, I said I was watching the I was I was catching up on the Drama Triangle and, yeah, I mean, the only term I would throw in there that you didn't mention when you're talking about these toxic empathy books, is this concept of weaponized empathy. I think that's a very key component to that whole sphere. Is that whether some people might be well intentioned, you know, in a good you know, intentions paid, you know, leads to hell. Sometimes you. And and then some people might actually be sociopathic and bad intentioned or or selfishly intention and might be weaponizing empathy for ulterior motives in the modern age with AI and algorithms, this is exactly what's happening constantly, actually, from every side of the political spectrum in every country on the planet. I believe so, and I think that's only going to magnify a whole other order of magnitude in the next year with the coming of super intelligent AI. So

Edwin Rutsch

15:37

so it's kind of a topic you're interested in. Is that that criticism, that empathy, is weaponized, so is that that's like a topic of interest?

Speaker 1

15:48

Well, I think it's just one of the most important things on the planet right now. I mean, it's, it's what it's, what's literally happening on all political science across the world.

Edwin Rutsch

15:59

Well, one thing I'm thinking was coming to mind is, if that's sort of like a topic you know, you're interested in, you could do some research on that, and we can actually maybe, you know, have a session where we talk about that and compare it to the holistic empathy model, because that's one of the big criticisms that's coming from those books is about weaponized empathy. And I have it on the list here, one of the things to address. But you could maybe, you know, kind of, if you're interested in that, one kind of focus on it, and, you know, present something on it, and, you know, write about it. And we can have a session to, you know, perhaps we can just talk about weapon, the criticism that empathy is weaponized. I think it's not. I disagree with that. So, you know, kind of having a discussion you know about that, I think really interesting

Speaker 1

16:54

your disagreements. I'm guessing that's on a definitional basis, because I, again, I felt like you and Kevin agreed fully, that was the feeling I got halfway through to the end of that discussion you had and so, yeah, so maybe it's my use of the word empathy, like weaponized. So I'm not sure how, why that doesn't land for you is true, because it seems kind of objectively true to me.

Edwin Rutsch

17:22

Yeah, so for me is, it's the it's the story of the torture. They say, Okay, if you're if you have the torture, has empathy. But what I'm saying is, you, you have, they might have empathy in sensing into the experience of the torture II that they want to torture, but when they start taking action to torture that person, they're no longer empathizing. It's the same thing with sympathy, right like right for sympathy is based on empathy. That's it gets confusing. So I see someone in distress, I sense their distress, but I shift from an empathic mindset to a sympathetic mindset, and I become more self focused, so at that point, you stopped having empathy. So the the so what I'm saying so it's not actually weaponized empathy, it's actually weaponizing the lack of empathy. The thing that you're calling weaponized empathy is not empathy. It's actually a block to empathy. Well, I just wanted to get Jodi's thoughts on this too.

Jodie Jenson

18:31

I need to think about a little bit more and listen to what you have to say. So Tasha, why don't you go ahead? Yeah,

Speaker 1

18:37

I mean, again, I think I need to be clear on your definition of empathy, because in especially in relationship to sympathy, sympathy is a word I have tried not to use almost my entire life. It's always come across to me as inherently patronizing in comparison with empathy. And so I think where I'm coming from is what I'm calling weaponized empathy would be directly connected with something I would call selective empathy. So I don't know if that would be an oxymoron to you, like a canceling of terms, if you think empathy is inherently for all or none, but what I'm saying is it's a very effective propaganda strategy to, you know, show starving children or a war zone or or X amount of things to pull on people's heartstrings. Maybe that's sympathy more than empathy, and then they're mad at the people who who are causing that, or you're told are causing that harm. And so this is where the empathy can be weaponized, in my view. But maybe I'm not using that word in a way. You use it

Edwin Rutsch

19:42

well, that's the reason for this definition project, to get clear on those issues, because it's, it's one of the major is you're and also doing it within the empathy circle, so in the Drama Triangle, one of the, one of the topics we had talked about. Uh, was one criticism is that empathy is only for your in group, right, and not for the out group. So when you're having empathy for the in group, and well, the person in the out group sees you as a perpetrator and themselves as a victim, because you're not listening to them, right? And you're kind of bringing, you're bringing, you're creating, you're coming into the Drama Triangle. But holistic empathy, if we put it into the, yeah, it's bringing this all into the empathy circle, I think is really helpful. So in the empathy circle, everyone is heard, everyone gets a chance to be heard and seen. So there is no out, right? And that's what I think, holistic empathy. Circle models holistic empathy, you know, if it's Jewish Palestinians, you know, everybody in the circle gets heard and seen, and nobody gets excluded. And that's what holistic empathy. So if somebody is excluded, it it's, it's a lack of empathy.

Jodie Jenson

21:06

Yeah, my thought on that is that it is, it is just a difference of definition. Because, like, if we're talking about empathy as a multi sided, like a holistic experience, like in this group, we are listening to each other, and we're sharing our own views. I see that as more of a a holistic form of empathy, where, like, we're all agreeing that we're going to openly listen to each other, as opposed to, I'm forcing you to listen to one side of it, or I'm like you were saying, pulling on your heartstrings, because I can see that as actually something that does end up being weaponized, where we only focus on one side of it. But that's where the Drama Triangle, like really juxtaposing that against the the empathy circle. That's where it becomes so beautifully clear that it you have one or the other. Like you can either fall into this trap that we all fall into, and society at large falls into of this Drama Triangle, or we can be open to the idea of listening to all sides of it. And I think that's the beauty of of the empathy circle.

Edwin Rutsch

22:19

I was just thinking, could we actually go into an empathy circle for to begin with this discussion, just to kind of set the tone, though, that would that work? Yeah, I like it. Okay, okay. Do you want to reflect Natasha, what you heard Jody said, you want to be the listener. You can kind of a it again,

Unknown Speaker

22:45

yeah, if you wouldn't mind saying it again,

Jodie Jenson

22:47

okay, let's see if I can remember everything I said. Or maybe, maybe I

Speaker 1

22:52

can give it a shot, and then you could maybe let me know if I might if I miss something. Yeah, um, so, yeah, you were saying, how you were acknowledging a truth in what I was saying that you could also see, and you were acknowledging a difference of definition possibly being a source of possible disagreement in what me and Edwin was saying. And then you mentioned the value of the Drama Triangle and juxtaposition to the entity circle. And you mentioned how all of us fall into this Drama Triangle, and it's a very real element of, you know, human life on Earth.

Jodie Jenson

23:38

Yeah, I think you fully understood what I said,

Edwin Rutsch

23:43

Awesome. Is there more or

Jodie Jenson

23:46

no? Yeah, I think I feel heard.

Speaker 1

23:51

Cool, yeah. So usually when I empty circles,

Edwin Rutsch

23:56

are you speaking to Oh, yeah. I'll keep time. We got five minutes. I'm not sure what format we're doing right now. Yeah, I'll go five minute, Max.

Speaker 1

24:05

Oh, wow. Okay, cool. Um, okay, so will you be my listener? Edwin,

Edwin Rutsch

24:10

yeah, I'm just bringing up a timer.

Unknown Speaker

24:13

Yeah, I'll put one of my computers. Oh,

Edwin Rutsch

24:16

there's one in the let's see. I've got one of my computers here, so you have one in the in in this zoom, there's, oh, you got the app you're looking for. The apps, is there a good one? Well, I'll just keep, go ahead. I'm listening.

Speaker 1

24:39

Starting mine as well. I'm drinking Blue Green Algae water right now.

Edwin Rutsch

24:47

Yeah, like you're feeling very good about the water you're drinking, and you want to share that with us.

Speaker 1

24:56

And I just started trying this new supplement. Got because it was on sale and it has these ingredients in it, sea Moss, which I've never tried before. So you just

Edwin Rutsch

25:11

wanted to show you where you're trying this new supplement. Seems like you're very happy about

Speaker 1

25:18

it. I'm noticing my bass guitar is not properly in its guitar fan.

Edwin Rutsch

25:28

Your bass isn't in the properly. You're just kind of noticing things around you, and your bass guitar is not properly at the stand,

Speaker 1

25:37

yeah, makes me a little concerned. I want to fix it, but I don't want to interrupt the it's not going anywhere, so I can wait.

Edwin Rutsch

25:48

You really like to fix that, but you're gonna focus here.

Speaker 1

25:54

And I just heard either my washer or dryer just finished the cycle

Edwin Rutsch

26:01

in your washer and dryer, you're kind of just being aware of your environment and sharing what you're hearing and sensing around you, following your train of thought,

Speaker 1

26:14

noticing your style of reflecting is quite different than I've experienced before,

Edwin Rutsch

26:19

and also noticing that my style of reflecting is different.

Speaker 1

26:26

Yeah, it almost seems like you're trying to reflect back, not just what I'm saying, or overarching within what I'm saying.

Edwin Rutsch

26:37

You broke up there a second, but I think you're saying that I'm reflecting back, kind of more than just the words that you're saying, kind of a deeper reflection,

Speaker 1

26:49

yeah, and maybe more like, like you're naming a constellation, like a shape of like, multiple things I'm saying,

Edwin Rutsch

26:56

yeah? So it's not just the individual things you're saying, but the constellation the shape of the things that you're saying,

Unknown Speaker

27:05

yeah? Well, yeah, let's see, yeah, I think empathy is important.

Edwin Rutsch

27:23

It's important.

Speaker 1

27:28

And, yeah, my understanding of clinical empathy was that there were two types.

Edwin Rutsch

27:39

You can say more, not I can take, take in more if you'd like to say more.

Speaker 1

27:49

Adjusting to your style, certainly, because I've been a year with other people.

Edwin Rutsch

27:53

Okay, so you're kind of more used to very short sentences, and so you're adjusting to this, the style here, and that you are also talking about clinical empathy, kind of looks like you've looked into clinical empathy?

Speaker 1

28:08

Well, yeah. Well, my understanding is that there's, I don't remember the technical terms, but one is more innate and comes from one part of the brain, and the other is more cognitive and learned, and that comes from a different part of the

Edwin Rutsch

28:24

brain, and with the clinical empathy, there's been the cognitive and the effective parts to two different types of empathy.

Speaker 1

28:33

Yeah, and I once a few years ago, for about three years, I was close friends with someone who from the first time I met him, I was, I thought he might be a sociopath, and then I was curious about that for the three years that I was close friends with him.

Edwin Rutsch

28:52

So you had a friend who you think was maybe a sociopath, and you're just kind of curious if, if he was for three years, you're kind of like wondering that.

Speaker 1

29:03

And then at one point, he was very obsessive about comparing himself with others with different psychometric tests, and he would get me and other friends and his girlfriend to compare against and like. And I remember I took an EQ, an emotional intelligence test that he sent me a link to that cost, like $10 to take online or something, and he took two different ones over a course of six months. I took the one and I see I've got five seconds left. Am I allowed in your title to continue? Or I'm not sure

Edwin Rutsch

29:40

I just finished your sentence, yeah,

Speaker 1

29:43

yeah, so, yeah, so, so, when I took the test at his request for fun, I scored an 85th percentile. Both times he took two different tests, he scored a perfect 100% Right? And the results said Either you are the most empathetic person possible or you are psychopathic.

Edwin Rutsch

30:08

So this test that you took it, you scaled at the 85% tile, and the test says that you're either very empathic or you're you're psychopath. No, no,

Speaker 1

30:24

um, no, no, no. I didn't say what it said for me, other than the 85 percentile, but what I was saying is, for him,

Edwin Rutsch

30:31

oh, for him. He took it. He took it, and it was 100% and that's it was for him, yeah, and that was,

Speaker 1

30:41

yeah, I wasn't sure if you fully understood what I said. Yeah,

Edwin Rutsch

30:45

that's I think I do now, do I know that? I get it? It was for him that he didn't. He took the test. He was 100% and it was not he was either a psychopath or very empathic.

Speaker 1

31:04

Yes, yes, that's right. Thank you. Okay,

Edwin Rutsch

31:10

let me get the hammer here. Okay, Jodi,

Unknown Speaker

31:16

yeah, I

Edwin Rutsch

31:18

must say, yeah. I wanted to kind of go back to the topic we had before, about feeling sorry for people, you know, you get the picture, you know, the starving child or something, and people say that you're being manipulated for for empathy, and how that fits in, you know, with, with the holistic empathy model.

Jodie Jenson

31:43

Okay, you're just wanting to return to the topic previously, of of these different definitions of empathy, and how, if you some people feel manipulated when they see pictures of starving children and and just now comparing it with other definitions,

Edwin Rutsch

31:58

and how does that fit within the context of the empathy circle too. Like, that's a little harder one to for me to put into into an empathy circle. But you know, people you know talk about, you know, like you had been in development work, you know, in Africa, I think. And then you know, people appeal to the starving people in Africa and, you know, send us money or what have you. So I'm just trying to think of how does that fit within the empathy circle.

Jodie Jenson

32:31

So it's, it's interesting to see that perhaps it's more difficult to fit that kind of use of empathy into the context of the empathy circle, like people working in nonprofits will ask people to give money to send to third world countries, and it's just interesting to explore how that might eventually fit into the empathy circle. Yeah. Is

Edwin Rutsch

33:01

it just a sympathetic response? Is there some empathy there, you know, and or is it starting with empathy? Because you see the starving child, you sense the feelings, and then you, then they shift you into a sympathetic response, which it's no longer empathy. It's more like feeling sorry.

Jodie Jenson

33:19

Yeah, so you're wondering if it, if it starts out with empathy, because you're venturing into the world of the the person that you're seeing in the picture, but then it maybe shifts to more of a feeling bad for and that's what promotes the the willingness to give money. But maybe it's not the same thing as as empathy.

Edwin Rutsch

33:39

And for me, the The Empathic response is saying, Okay, there's this dysfunction in Africa or Israel, you know, Palestine, and you can feel sorry for one side or the other, or you can say there's an empathy deficit. You know, if, if the societies themselves were more empathic, there wouldn't probably be this problem. They would, you know, highly empathic societies, mutually empathic or holistic are going to be more functional, you know? So it's like the issue is, how do we create an in a culture of empathy in those societies?

Jodie Jenson

34:14

So rather than using empathy, or perhaps sympathy to encourage people to give money to help others. Maybe the focus should be more on creating empathic societies within the company the countries or communities where we see these issues, because if there were this more holistic empathy, perhaps we wouldn't see the problems that we see.

Edwin Rutsch

34:39

And it comes into topics like immigration, right? People are like, feeling sorry for immigrants, you know, who are coming across illegally, and then it's like, either you're, you know, wanting to kick them out, or you're feeling sorry for them. There's also, like, where the cultures that they're coming from are on low empathy cultures. There's a lot of gang violence, you know, there are. Oritarian. So the issue is that where they're coming from, if they were in a highly empathic society, they probably wouldn't be coming across illegally, right? So it's a different way of seeing that we need to be creating cultures of empathy in these situations, versus just feeling sorry for them and giving some money or what have you.

Jodie Jenson

35:20

Yeah, so extending what you were saying earlier to the example of immigration, a lot of people feel bad for immigrants who are coming across the border, and perhaps a more effective use of time and resources is to approach the level of empathy within the culture that they're coming from, because perhaps they're they're trying to leave their countries of origin, because it's not an empathic society,

Edwin Rutsch

35:48

and also to bring immigrants and all stakeholders together to have an empathy circle. Dramatic. This

Jodie Jenson

36:00

makes me laugh every time. Yeah,

Edwin Rutsch

36:02

so I'll just finish it's, it's having, you know, having the political right, political left and the immigrants themselves, having empathy circles to talk about the issues, because you want to hear people who are concerned about immigration. You want to hear all stakeholders. So the empathy circle is creating that environment for all sides to speak.

Jodie Jenson

36:22

So an effective approach to this could be holding an empathy circles with people from who or the immigrants themselves, and perhaps people from the political left on the political right, all of the different stakeholders who are concerned about it from different perspectives, and helping them to see the perspective of the

Edwin Rutsch

36:41

other side. I feel heard. Yeah, okay,

Jodie Jenson

36:48

I guess let's see a Tasha, I'm just going to follow my own train of thought here, just based on some of the things we've been talking about. I am interested. This is going to be a question that perhaps Edwin can respond to later when it says, Turn again. But I would love to know where this article can be accessed. This Dan Batson article, because I was able to listen to it, but I wasn't able to find it online to read it, and so I would love to just mark it up and really deeply synthesize what I'm learning from it.

Speaker 1

37:28

Okay, so you were able to listen to something about the article, but you'd like to read it more deeply synthesize this article by Dan Batson.

Jodie Jenson

37:36

Yeah, because I've read a lot of articles from Dan Batson, and he does talk about these eight different forms of empathy, or related phenomena that are often called empathy. And I just I loved the article. I loved digging in deeper into each one of those different phenomena, but then also seeing how it maps onto a specific real world situation.

Speaker 1

38:06

Okay, word. I might have missed something, but I feel like you were saying you want to see how this maps onto real world situations. And you love his work and the other art, other articles you read about him, is that I get it did I get it all or do and

Jodie Jenson

38:21

then more than, let's see, I'm just going to I'm looking at this that Edwin just put in the chat. Okay, so this is the full article. Okay, thank you. So yeah, in his other articles, he does talk about these eight concepts, but I haven't ever seen this one specifically that goes into so much depth into each one of the phenomena.

Speaker 1

38:45

Okay, so you're familiar with them, talking about these eight, but you haven't heard him yet. Go into depth about each of the eight with examples.

Jodie Jenson

38:56

Yeah. And so the specific example at the beginning of the article with, you know, going to lunch with a friend, and she shares that she has lost her job. And it's a pretty brief scenario. And I thought it was really interesting how each one of those eight phenomena occurred within this very brief little scenario, and how they were able to parse that out in the article.

Speaker 1

39:23

Okay, so you appreciated the article. You did read about some people going to lunch and and the use of that as an example of empathy was effective for you.

Jodie Jenson

39:35

Yeah, it was really helpful to see it broken out like that. The thing that has been interesting and difficult for me to wrap my brain around with the study of empathy is why we use one term to mean so many different things.

Speaker 1

39:56

Hmm, so you have curiosity about why do we use. Is this one term for that has at least eight different

Jodie Jenson

40:05

definitions. And I mean, I've even seen it used to mean other things. I mean active listening is one of them. Emotion contagion does come up in here. And I just think it's surprising, just coming into it a bit later in my life. I'm I'm not just, I'm not the typical graduate student who comes right out of undergrad and then goes straight into their studies. And so I've had a life of experiencing empathy, and so I had a clear idea in my mind of how I defined it, and now reading the literature, I'm surprised by how it's used in the literature, because it doesn't match with the way that I thought that the word was meant to be used.

Speaker 1

40:55

Yeah. So you've had a lot of leaves experience with empathy and before, just throughout your life, and you've also had a gap between, I guess, your college degree and getting a PhD now, and you've been a bit surprised by all these different academic definitions of empathy. And you also mentioned there, what was it something about the active listening and some and something else you mentioned as additional definitions of that that you've heard used by people?

Jodie Jenson

41:31

Yeah, and I, that's why I've been really interested to dig into it, because I can't study a subject that I don't understand, like what it is I'm even studying. So it's been a it's been a real challenge, because I came into it knowing I was going to study empathy and it was going to be straightforward, but it has, it has proven to be a lot more complex than I thought it would be.

Speaker 1

42:00

So you've been a bit taken aback by how it's been a lot more complex than you thought it would be.

Jodie Jenson

42:06

Yeah, I feel heard. Thank you.

Speaker 1

42:09

Thank you, Jody. Just to switch it up, would you like to be my listener? Jody, sure. I'd be happy to cool so, yeah, I'm curious about this correlation between like that, ex friend of mine, someone who could have cognitive empathy to the degree that would surpass 99% of empaths. I'm very curious about the use of the concept of empathy for someone like that.

Jodie Jenson

42:44

So you're really interested to dig more into the use of the term empathy when you have a friend who scored higher on cognitive empathy than 99% of other people, and just trying to understand that more,

Speaker 1

43:00

yeah, or, I guess I'm still with these two definitions. Oh, and I don't see a timer on my screen. Edwin, I didn't start mine this time, so I'm not sure where I'm at. I'll just start mine now, I guess, oh, now I see. Okay, thanks. Yeah, I guess I'm very I guess I've grown comfortable with having only two definitions of empathy, which come from, I guess, medical diagnosis type stuff and so like, like Edwin name, I guess the two of them, effective empathy and cog cognitive empathy, which, like I mentioned, neuro neuroscience has shown actually access totally different parts of the brain.

Jodie Jenson

43:43

Okay, so you have grown comfortable with the the cognitive and affective definition of empathy, and even neuroscience shows that it they those processes take place in different parts of the

Speaker 1

43:57

brain, yes. And so my understanding is that cognitive empathy is something that is learned, and it's a way to function in society for someone who lacks the innate, effective empathy that maybe at least 85% of people are born with, and basically,

Jodie Jenson

44:21

okay, so you're saying that the affective empathy for 85% of people is something that they're born with, like, it's an innate ability, but cognitive is something that needs to be learned.

Speaker 1

44:38

Yes, yes. And the innate it's a little more complicated than that, because it also relates to environment and parents and epigenetic type stuff. But, yeah, but most people, the vast majority, have effective empathy, and then a minority of people with on the autism spectrum and on the sociopath. Spectrum have to learn through cognitive empathy in order to function relationally in society. This is my understanding.

Jodie Jenson

45:08

So your understanding is that, with the the 85% of people are people who are not on the autism spectrum or in the sociopathic spectrum, whereas those people don't have that innate ability to empathically, affectively connect with people, so they have to learn cognitively how to interact effectively with people.

Speaker 1

45:33

Yeah, yeah. And then another interesting corollary to this that I've discovered in the past year is, is the CIA and intelligence agencies around the world, the way they psychologically profile during their recruiting process is they want people who are on the sociopathic spectrum, but not too far, and they want People who are empathetic but not too much effective empathy, and I find that very interesting. And I'm not sure if there's been any research or if there's legally allowed to be any research on such a thing, since those are confidential recruiting processes that I've just garnered, like bits of information about

Jodie Jenson

46:18

so you've been learning bits and pieces over the last few years of of the CIA and other intelligence agencies around the world, how they recruit people. They do. They undergo some profiling, and they you have found that they they want to have people who are somewhat, did you say somewhat sociopathic? Okay, it's somewhat empathic, but not too much on either,

Speaker 1

46:44

yes, yes and yeah, yeah. I heard that this, that the CIA greatly values people who have empathy, but also who are on this can you know, or morally, you know, can exist in a moral gray area quite easily, which would correlate to sociopathy.

Jodie Jenson

47:05

So you have heard that they are interested in people who are able to empathize but also are feel comfortable in a morally gray area, which which would mean that they would be on the sociopathic spectrum.

Speaker 1

47:20

Yeah, yeah. And I know the timer started a little late for me, so I'm happy to I feel fully heard, and I'm happy to pass it. Thank

Jodie Jenson

47:27

you. Jody, okay, thank you. Um, all right, Edwin, maybe I'll talk to you. I feel like, I feel like I said the things I wanted to say, but so I I may just follow my train of thought on this.

Edwin Rutsch

47:41

Yeah, you already said what you want to say. You're gonna follow a train of thought here.

Jodie Jenson

47:46

Okay, um, let's see. And as as I've told you before, and I know you've experienced this with me, that when I'm in the middle of an empathy circle, I I want to just be fully present. And so then I forget what I was going to say,

Edwin Rutsch

48:00

yeah. And an empathy story, you try to be really present, and then you forget where you're going. You're we're going to say

Jodie Jenson

48:07

yeah. And I know you told me before to write down my thoughts when they come to me, but I've been so present today that I have not even been doing that.

Edwin Rutsch

48:15

And one idea I had before was you could take notes, but you haven't been doing that. Yeah,

Jodie Jenson

48:22

just in favor of being fully present with what what is being said.

Edwin Rutsch

48:26

Yes, you've been really present with what things have been said, and that keeps you from taking time to take notes.

Jodie Jenson

48:32

I find it really fascinating that you interviewed Dan Batson, and I actually haven't watched this video yet. He's obviously one of the people that has done a lot of research in the area of empathy over the years, and so when it's your turn to respond, I would, I would love to hear more about your experiences talking with him and other people who are just kind of the big names in empathy.

Edwin Rutsch

48:58

Yeah, you're you see that I had talked to Dan Batson. You're just wondering what my thoughts are about him and other big names in empathy.

Jodie Jenson

49:08

And I know that we've talked about this before, like some of the other people that you've interviewed, I feel like it would it behooves me to take more time to watch these videos. It's something I'm struggling with right now, though, is outside of our meetings, I feel like I have so much, so much homework, like there's always like my to do list that I have up on my wall in front of me is like, so massive that I never have time to do things that I I want to do? Yeah,

Edwin Rutsch

49:43

you got a huge to do list with all that you're you're with your studies, everything else, and so you don't have much time outside of this time to work on the watching videos and so forth.

Jodie Jenson

49:56

Yeah, which I can see that there's, there's a real detriment to that, because. We could make more progress on this project if I had the time to devote to it, outside of the meetings as well.

Edwin Rutsch

50:07

Yeah, you can see that we'd make more progress if you had more time.

Jodie Jenson

50:14

Yeah. And I mean, so I'm working on empathy projects, and I know I've shared a lot of that with you, like the research that I'm doing, the theoretical research, but I'm also working on projects with regard to, like intrinsic motivation and other development of other character traits and virtues.

Edwin Rutsch

50:33

And so you're working on character development, traits, motivation, a lot of different topics, several couple of different topics.

Jodie Jenson

50:41

Yeah, so I find that it pulls my attention a lot in a lot of different directions, which I think is valuable, because it helps me to see empathy more holistically. And when I say holistically, I'm not talking about like the way that we've been using the term holistic, but how empathy fits into a broader spectrum of virtues?

Edwin Rutsch

51:04

Yeah, you have different areas that you're kind of exploring, but you think that that can't is helpful because you're seeing empathy from these different perspectives, sort of a bigger picture, maybe.

Jodie Jenson

51:16

Yeah, so although it's not, it's not directly applicable in the moment to what we're talking about in the meetings. I do feel like in the long run, it's actually going to help the project more the fact that I'm not just focusing on empathy, yeah,

Edwin Rutsch

51:33

you think it'll be helpful that you're not just focusing on empathy, because you're getting this bigger picture, and that's going to help the project in general,

Jodie Jenson

51:42

yeah. So I'm looking at it from the perspective of social psychology, which is like, I've been doing a lot of study on understanding the self and how the self relates to the other, which is very much only needed in like social interactions. But I'm also looking at it from the perspective of developmental psychology, which is, how do you develop this skill over time?

Edwin Rutsch

52:05

So you're looking at it from the social how do you how do you do it? How do you develop not to develop it. How do you empathize in a relation, in relationships, as well as developmentally? Like, I think you mean like from childhood on, developmental

Jodie Jenson

52:21

Yeah, and developmental psychology, like a lot of times, people think of it as just childhood, like, child development, adolescent development. But this can also be looked at it as like through the course of this empathy circle, I learned this skill so it doesn't have to be okay life,

Edwin Rutsch

52:39

and it doesn't have to be from childhood on. It can be within a context. How did you develop? How do you learn within that context? And that was, I definitely feel heard. Thank you, Edwin, and I'll speak to Tasha,

Jodie Jenson

52:56

and I, oh, shoot, I have to leave in just a minute. So probably at the end of this one, I'm going to have to head out.

Edwin Rutsch

53:02

Okay, should we want to say anything for next week?

Jodie Jenson

53:06

Or, yeah, maybe we should. Maybe we should wrap up the empathy circle part of it and just have some closing

Edwin Rutsch

53:14

thoughts. Let's do that. I have to leave in about five minutes. Okay, then let's just have some closing and especially, what we're going What do you want to work on bring to next, the one thing I would say ask is when we talk about these different topics, like, you know, a Tasha was talking about the affective and cognitive empathy to bring it into the empathy circle. Like, where does this stuff play out in the empathy circle, like I'm saying when I'm listening to someone. I don't think is this effective or cognitive. It's all this one so, you know, instead of it being abstract, I just would be one request to try to bring it in and also just to make it more concrete, I think. And the other is, what next? What do you want? I'm going to be working on, you know, the just my presentations. So

Jodie Jenson

54:11

I think it is absolutely imperative that we deeply understand this article. Thank you again for for posting it for us. Because I don't know why I hadn't seen this one, because it I love how much depth that goes into into each of the different phenomena. And I mean, I had been researching this just because I had seen it like, very briefly in some of his other papers. And so I've been digging into each one of them. And so I feel like I like I've researched each one of them, but not all within one paper. So I just loved it so much. So thank you so much for sharing that

Edwin Rutsch

54:47

with us. Yeah, it's critical, like empathic, unappreciated way of being by Rogers and this one TC is two really, really good, important articles, papers. Yeah, captures, synthesize. Faces a lot,

Jodie Jenson

55:02

so I would love to, let's see going going from here, maybe just having another discussion, like really digging in deep into these two articles. Would that be something we could do?

Edwin Rutsch

55:15

Okay, talk about the Dan Batson one next time. Yeah, okay, kind of go deep.

Jodie Jenson

55:21

If you have the the Carl Rogers one that you could share with us, do you have that on the website?

Edwin Rutsch

55:28

Um, I do. It's, uh,

Jodie Jenson

55:34

empathic way of being right, uh

Edwin Rutsch

55:36

huh. And that's the one that Tasha is viewing. Now, I think right, you're, you're talking, you just, you mentioned that too, and that's

Jodie Jenson

55:47

sorry, Natasha, were you talking about a book by Carl Roger called Carl Rogers called a way of being, or is it an empathic way of being? Which one it's the book? The book called being? Oh,

Edwin Rutsch

56:01

there's, there's the article, and it's a video too. It's kind of nice. You can watch the videos of him talking. I just put the link in.

Jodie Jenson

56:12

Yeah, I think I just need to listen to some of those as I drive to and from campus.

Edwin Rutsch

56:18

Okay? And the other thing is, if we talk about the eight, you know, Dan Batson is how to eat. I like how, how he has that story. But we could take that story, put it into an empathy circle, to like, we could even role play like, you know, the person lost their job, where we actually kind of role play it. And where do these different parts play out in the empathy circle.

Jodie Jenson

56:42

I like that idea because it makes it more practical.

Edwin Rutsch

56:47

Yeah, that story is really helpful. Yeah, I think so too.

Jodie Jenson

56:53

Well, I guess the question is a Tasha, if this, if this seems like a good fit with the direction we're going with this,

Speaker 1

57:03

yeah, I think I'm more interested in just being a part of empty circles and hosting my own than Yeah, the research part of like, what it all means, but, but, but I'm glad that you were you allowed The two of you allowed me to voice my interests in this matter, which are, how does this correlate with sociopathy and the form of cognitive empathy? I mean, I think the simple answer to that, in regard to your empathy circles would be, wouldn't be too much of an issue. Probably I would expect it to be very unlikely for sociopathic people with high cognitive empathy to be a part of an entity circle. I just don't see much cause, you know, unless there was some incentive for that, for them to do that. I think people with effective empathy, from my experience and logically, it just makes sense, are pretty much every person I've ever met in an empathy circle and and the other thing I just want to put on your both of your radar just is this one really interesting psychology professor. I forget where maybe Georgia or something, but his name's Greg Henriquez, and he came to mind Jody, because you were mentioning the social stuff, and that's one of the things he specializes in. And there might be some something useful. I mean, his work for you to be aware What's his last name. Again, Henriquez, H, E, N, R, I, Q, U, E, S. He has a really interesting and deep model he's been working on for like, 20 or 30 years that tends to combine all these different fields of psychology, social, self is a big part

Jodie Jenson

58:50

of it. Cool. Thank you. I appreciate that because I've been studying that a lot the last several days,

Edwin Rutsch

58:54

and I just

Speaker 1

58:56

put it and he has a new book out. Just, you know, he has a book that was recently published. It's his first non textbook, book that's just called Utah u t okay, and it's, it's just an excellent distillation of his work. I think if you wanted to check that

Jodie Jenson

59:11

out, yeah, thank you.

Edwin Rutsch

59:12

I put a link into my interviews and empathy circles with Sam Vaknin. He's been diagnosed is a narcissist with psychopathic tendencies, and he was sort of a go to guy in Europe. They if the media are to talk to a psychopath, they would talk to him. And there's a documentary about him too, called I psychopath. And my sister followed him a lot, because he talks about psychopathy, and she saw my empathy circle with him, and she said it was the most interesting thing she'd seen. Is he did really well in the empathy circle, and really kind of opened up and so

Speaker 1

59:55

or or he convinced everyone he did to.

Edwin Rutsch

01:00:01

Well, there is, yeah, he did, I Yeah, it's he was able to listen well. And the problem is, is, then, if you, if you make that as you're going to be not believing people in general, yeah, are they really empathizing and not so?

Unknown Speaker

01:00:21

Yeah, it's a real issue.

Edwin Rutsch

01:00:25

Well, okay, so we talk about that next week that we'll go over. And it sounds like this. This is a really a work group. So, you know, like you're kind of wanting more of the free flow, kind of exploration, and, you know, we're but it was good, great to have your input and your thoughts. So appreciate that.

Jodie Jenson

01:00:45

Yeah, definitely.

Edwin Rutsch

01:00:48

Thank you. Yeah, great that you're doing the trainings and the empathy circles. You know, it's keep spreading it. So,

Speaker 1

01:00:58

yeah, yeah, yeah, I love it. And yeah, thank you for having me.

Edwin Rutsch

01:01:03

I better hop off. Okay, we'll see you next week. Then

Jodie Jenson

01:01:06

bye, bye.

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