David Howe is currently an Emeritus Professor in the School
of Social Work and Psychology at the University of East Anglia. After an early career as a child
care officer and social worker, in 1976 David Howe began his present
career as a university researcher and teacher. His research and writing interests
span social work theory, adoption, emotional intelligence, attachment
theory, and child abuse and neglect.
To
date, David has written 17 books, many of them regarded as best-sellers.
He is author of Empathy: What it is and why it matters. "Empathy is key to good relationships. In its absence, behavior becomes
puzzling, even dangerous. David Howe's fascinating new book examines what
empathy is, why we have it and how it develops. He explores the important
part empathy plays in child development and therapeutic work as well as
its significance for how society organizes itself."
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"Empathy is profoundly important for understanding people's feelings and
behaviour. It is not only an essential skill in conducting successful
personal and working relationships, it also helps us understand what
makes people moral and societies decent. With this compelling book,
David Howe invites the reader on an illuminating journey of discovery
into how empathy was first conceptualised and how its influence has
steadily risen and spread.
He captures the growing significance of empathy to many
fields, from evolutionary psychology and brain science to moral
philosophy and mental health. In doing so, he eloquently explains its
importance to child development, intimate relationships, therapy, the
creative arts, neurology and ethics. Written with light touch, this is
an authoritative and insightful guide to empathy, its importance, why we
have it and how it develops. It offers an invaluable introduction for
readers everywhere, including those studying or working in psychology,
counselling, psychotherapy, social work, health, nursing and education."
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
How did the book come about?
1. Introducing Empathy
Empathy, high and low
Mind reading
Outline and Aim
2. Origins and Definitions
Art and aesthetics
Defining Empathy
Personal Distress and emotional contagion
Empathy and Sympathy
Affective and cognitive empathy
The socially skilled mind reader
Empathy inn context and in person
An idea whose time has come
Conclusion
3. The Evolution of the Empathic Mind
Connect and select
The cognitive challenges of social living
Putting the Family First
Empathy and Care
Conclusion
4. How Children Develop Empathy
Natural Differences in empathy
The social origins of empathy
The sociable baby
The language of feeling
Mind-mindedness
Conclusion
5. The Empathic Brain
Making Sense of the World
A self-organizing development structures
Social Neuroscience
Blending and Belonging
Empathy circuits
Oxytocin and the bonds of love
Brain, stress and empathy
Conclusion
6. Individual Differences in Empathy Levels
The person, the situation and social behaviour
Minding about sex
Empathizers and sympathizers
Foetal brain development
Skills and gender
Personality and temperament
Conclusion
7. When Empathy is Absent or Low
Conditions of low empathy
Socially induced states of low empathy
Empathy, illness and psychiatric disorders
Autism
Intense world theory of autism
Dementia
Empathy failures and compassion fatigue
Conclusion
8. Psychopathy and Borderline Personality Disorder
Negative Empathy
Psychopathy
The childcare background of psychopaths
Working with BPD
Conclusion
9. Social Perspectives and Client Experiences
The problem of interpretation and meaning
Active empathy
The rise of the empathic counselor
The core conditions
Client, patient and consumer studies
Feeling understood
Everyone has won and all must have prizes
Conclusion
10. Empathic Communication and Helping Relationships
Being Empathic
Empathy's values and virtues
The models and makeup of therapeutic empathy
Experiential mode of empathic understanding
Communication mode of empathic understanding
Observational mode of empathic understanding
Goal-corrected empathic attunement metallization
and feeling safe
Staying in touch
Conclusion
11. Why Empathy Works
Forming and reforming psychological selves
Feeling understood
Relationships and regulation
Dismantling defenses with empathy
The formation and reformation of the social self
Talking cures
Controlling the meaning of one's own experiences
Relationship and the plastic brain
Conclusion
12 Empathy, Morals and Prosocial Behaviour
Living well together
Sympathy, empathy and morals
Moral principles
Altruism, behaving pro-socially and regard for others
Altruism or egoisms?
Empathy, similarity and differences
Imagining the other
Imitation and intimacy
Development of pro-social behaviors
Conclusion
13 Promoting Empathy in Children
Encouraging children to be empathic
At home with empathy
Empathy in pre-school years
Social and emotional learning in the schools
Conclusion
14. Promoting Empathy in Adults
Empathy Training
Empathy and the everyday
Creating art
Reading Fiction
Writing Fiction
Affective role taking
Conclusion
15 Living Well Together: Empathy and Social Cohesion
Social relationships
Empathy and benefits
Effortful control an cognitive empathy
Holding Society together
Equality and inequality, selflessness and selfishness
