Empathy as a Personality Disposition

MacKayfs initial chapter of this book demonstrates the complexity of the empathy construct by reviewing various definitions and conceptualizations of empathy. The present chapter analyzes empathy as a personality disposition. Empathy-like any personality disposition-possesses four levels of meaning. These four levels of meaning are: (1) global, evaluative impressions about an actor perceived by an audience; (2) regularities in an actor's behavior that are responsible for these global impressions; (3) conscious desires and plans that guide an actor's behavior; and (4) latent structures responsible for an actor's desires and plans. These four layers of personality help explain, respectively, (1) how empathy affects the helping relationship; (2) which specific behaviors can be taught in empathy training programs; (3) why people act empathically or unempathically in social interaction; and (4) the natural constraints on empathy development in training programs.