Empathy as an Existential Attitude
Abstract
The attempts that have hitherto been made to schematize the meanings of the term "empathy" have most often been limited to come up with a separate characterization of its emotional and cognitive aspects, or else with their combined grasps. Thus it seems we are totally justified in taking those aspects as the dimensions of an empathetic attitude.
To take empathy as an attitude allows us to stress the subjective function of the person, who as a living whole, is sensitive to that which is in their direct surrounding and takes a certain stance towards their surrounding.
To define empathy as an existential attitude is not so much to be oriented at grasping the ability to be similar or to imitate others' feelings (Dilthey), but rather to be able to accept one's own individuality and, at the same time, the individuality of another person (Stein, Rogers).
The emphatic attitude is therefore expressed in emotional sensitivity to the actual psychic state of another person, in spontaneous emotional expressions of openness to that which is dear and significant for the other person, or which that person avoids and fears, and in affective harmony in this view as to the strength and direction, without losing the sense of harmony with one's personal feelings.
The emphatic attitude is also expressed in the tendency to understanding cognition of the individuality of the other person. This is manifested by the recognition of the other person's rights to change their standpoints, way of viewing things and the ways the person grasps what they express and prefer.
Eventually, the emphatic attitude is manifested more in a synergistic behavior than imitative or reproductive. This is expressed in readiness to take up actions in accordance with the way and direction of the action of the person with whom one is in direct relation. Then one tends to create for the other person appropriate conditions for the expression of their individual manners of experience and behaviour.
The emphatic attitude may then be taken as an attitude of openness to the encounter with the other person and participation with them in the surrounding world, which is a common life-giving soil, a field of work and background of preference and orientations. This world becomes a world-in-which-we-live, a world of the events of encounter, mutual understanding and cooperation, so that it could become more human and dignified.
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