Quiz — Chapter 21: Empathy and Compassion — Seeing Through Other Eyes

25 questions. Multiple choice unless otherwise noted. Answer key at the end.

1. The chapter distinguishes three aspects of empathy. Which of the following correctly matches an aspect with its description?

a) Cognitive empathy = the vicarious emotional experience of feeling what another feels b) Affective empathy = the intellectual understanding of another's mental state and perspective c) Empathic concern = the caring motivation and desire to help d) Empathic concern = the neural resonance underlying emotional contagion

2. Brené Brown's distinction between empathy and sympathy characterizes sympathy as:

a) A more genuine form of care than empathy because it is less emotionally costly b) Acknowledgment of another's distress from a position of relative comfort and safety c) Empathy directed toward people in formal helping relationships d) Caring action that accompanies the experience of another's distress

3. Mirror neurons are relevant to the neuroscience of empathy because they:

a) Store memories of emotional events that can be recalled during empathic engagement b) Fire both when performing an action and when observing someone else perform it, providing a mechanism for resonance c) Regulate the emotional contagion that produces empathic distress d) Are located specifically in the empathy network, distinct from other social brain areas

4. "Empathic distress," as distinguished from "empathic concern," is characterized by:

a) The experience of another's pain as one's own, producing the desire to escape rather than help b) Feeling intense compassion for someone who is suffering c) Professional empathy that maintains appropriate boundaries d) Empathy that is so intense it produces physical symptoms

5. Tania Singer's research on empathy found that people who experienced others' pain primarily as empathic distress showed:

a) More helping behavior due to the strength of their emotional response b) Greater accuracy in reading others' emotional states c) Less helping behavior — the desire to escape the discomfort interfered with helping d) Higher rates of compassion fatigue but also higher reported meaning in work

6. Paul Bloom's critique in Against Empathy is primarily directed at:

a) Empathy as a general psychological capacity b) Affective empathy as a moral guide — particularly its biases and sustainability limitations c) The use of empathy in professional contexts d) The concept of self-compassion as a substitute for genuine empathy

7. Which of the following is NOT listed as a limitation of affective empathy identified in Bloom's critique?

a) It is biased toward the proximate, similar, and immediately visible b) It cannot coexist with compassionate caring action c) It can intensify conflict in high-conflict situations d) It is exhausting and not sustainable at scale

8. Bloom's concept of "rational compassion" refers to:

a) The cognitive component of empathy that understands others' situations rationally b) Caring about wellbeing as a general principle without requiring affective identification with specific individuals c) The use of cost-benefit reasoning to determine how much compassion to extend d) Compassion mediated by the rational prefrontal cortex rather than the emotional limbic system

9. Kristin Neff identifies three components of self-compassion. Which of the following correctly pairs a component with its contrast?

a) Self-kindness — contrasted with self-criticism b) Common humanity — contrasted with social comparison c) Mindfulness — contrasted with isolation d) Self-kindness — contrasted with isolation

10. The research finding about self-compassion and motivation that most contradicts popular concerns is:

a) Self-compassion reduces anxiety but also reduces motivation b) Self-compassion is more effective for people with low self-esteem than high self-esteem c) Self-compassionate people maintain high standards and recover from failure faster, without lowering the bar d) Self-compassion effects are primarily cultural and do not generalize across populations

11. Compassion fatigue, as described in the chapter, is distinguished from ordinary burnout in that:

a) It affects only professional caregivers, not personal relationships b) It is specifically produced by sustained empathic engagement with others' suffering, including secondary traumatic stress c) It is more chronic and less recoverable than burnout d) It affects the cognitive aspects of work rather than the emotional aspects

12. The research on compassion meditation (metta) found that it:

a) Increases affective empathy but at the cost of increased empathic distress b) Decreases empathic distress while increasing empathic concern c) Primarily affects the cognitive empathy component rather than affective components d) Produces effects only after sustained long-term practice

13. Which of the following best describes the "fixing impulse" discussed in the chapter?

a) The tendency to become absorbed in others' problems at the expense of one's own functioning b) The default of replacing empathic presence with problem-solving, serving the responder's discomfort reduction as much as the other's needs c) The compassionate urge to address structural causes of suffering rather than immediate distress d) The cognitive process of identifying what went wrong in a difficult situation

14. Research by Mar, Oatley, and colleagues found that reading literary fiction was associated with:

a) Increased emotional regulation capacity b) Higher scores on theory of mind tasks, related to the perspective-taking practice it requires c) Reduced empathic distress because it normalizes suffering d) Increased affective empathy but decreased cognitive empathy

15. In Tania Singer's research comparing compassion training to empathy training:

a) Empathy training produced stronger long-term effects on prosocial behavior b) Compassion training increased caring concern and reduced empathic distress; empathy training could increase empathic distress c) The two types of training produced identical effects on helping behavior d) Compassion training was only effective for people with prior contemplative practice

16. "Epistemic humility" in the context of empathy across difference means:

a) Acknowledging that one's empathy for others may be imperfect b) Recognizing that one's own experience does not provide the reference point for others' experiences c) The humble acknowledgment that empathy is less important than concrete action d) Deferring to others' accounts of their experience without forming one's own perspective

17. The chapter identifies the primary obstacle to compassionate action in everyday life as:

a) The cost in time and resources of sustained compassionate behavior b) Empathy fatigue that reduces awareness of others' needs c) Not the cost of action but the decision to act — noticing and attending are the primary barriers d) Conflicting demands that compete with compassionate response

18. The research on "prosocial behavior" by Algoe and Haidt found that:

a) Large gestures of compassion are more impactful than small ones b) Small acts of specific attention and appreciation are more impactful than recipients expect and more available than actors realize c) Compassionate behavior is primarily driven by trait-level dispositional factors d) Acts of compassion are most effective when they require visible sacrifice

19. The chapter's discussion of empathy across difference concludes that:

a) Full affective empathy across wide experiential gaps is impossible and should not be attempted b) Partial but meaningful cognitive empathy across difference is possible through deliberate perspective-taking and epistemic humility c) Demographic similarity is a prerequisite for genuine empathic connection d) Research does not support the possibility of intergroup empathy

20. The most consistent finding on compassion fatigue prevention identified in the chapter is:

a) Limiting caregiving hours to prevent empathic overload b) Supervision and peer support, combined with self-compassion practices and somatic recovery c) Maintaining emotional distance from clients or those one helps d) Specializing in less emotionally demanding aspects of caregiving work

21. The "common humanity" component of self-compassion (Neff) involves:

a) Acknowledging others' suffering as comparable to one's own b) Recognizing that suffering and imperfection are part of the shared human experience — that one is not uniquely flawed c) Building social connections that provide companionship during difficult periods d) The social comparison process that normalizes one's own situation

22. "Secondary traumatic stress" is distinguished from compassion fatigue in that:

a) Secondary traumatic stress affects only direct victims, not helpers b) It refers specifically to the vicarious traumatization produced by close contact with trauma survivors c) It is less severe and more quickly recovered from than compassion fatigue d) It occurs only in formal professional contexts, not personal relationships

23. Which of the following is identified in the chapter as the most helpful response when someone is distressed and does not yet know what kind of support they need?

a) Immediately offering the most practical help available b) Asking: "What do you need right now?" c) Providing empathic presence for a defined period before asking any questions d) Assessing the situation and determining the best response independently

24. The chapter's account of empathy in the context of conflict mediation draws on research suggesting that:

a) Highly empathic mediators produce better outcomes b) Mediators with less affective empathy and more cognitive empathy tend to be more effective c) Empathy for both parties simultaneously is the most effective mediator orientation d) Self-disclosure by the mediator increases empathic connection and improves outcomes

25. The "receiving empathy" exercise (21.15) and Jordan's opening scene both address a pattern that the chapter suggests is common. This pattern is:

a) Difficulty expressing empathy in words rather than actions b) The tendency to deflect or minimize when another person attempts to be genuinely present with one's difficulty c) The fixing impulse — offering solutions when presence is needed d) Empathic distress — becoming overwhelmed by another person's emotional experience

Answer Key