Empathy Gym Practicum - Optional Assignment

Empathy Gym Practicum

• In this optional practicum, you will look for opportunities in your experience over the next few weeks to practice "The Seven Keys to Empathy" from Helen Reiss' The Empathy Effect. You will "collect" 3-5 empathy interaction stories in a journal. Then you will report your experiences in an 2-4 page report that you will send me by email, hopefullyby Founder’s Day. You can reference your empathy interactions in your report to me, but you do not need to turn in your primary journal.

• Collecting Empathic Interactions -- Empathic interactions involve emotional engagement which includes both Positive and Negative affect states of others (PAS or NAS). By contrast, low empathy interactions are mostly transactional, with little opportunity to share affect states. You will find that having "high empathy interactions" is more likely if you practice the verbal and non-verbal behaviors in the Reiss chapter. Empathy situations often occur either because someone you know presents you with an "affect state" or because you elicit such states from others by using the right social communication skills, as Reiss describes it.

• Your empathy interaction journal: Write up each empathy interaction in a private journal. Note the effects of Reiss' advice. Was the interaction about PAS or NAS? How did the interaction leave you and the other person feeling? Compare your experience to more transactional interactions. Did the empathy interaction involve someone in an "out group" or "in groups" in relation to you (Richer/poorer, family member/friend/stranger, same or different ethnicity, etc.). Did the interaction involve "hurdles" to empathy like moral judgement?

• Your empathy report -- In a 2-4 page report, consider some of the specific experiences you have had and reflect on the practice of empathy at a general level. Did it promote "connectedness" for you others in any significant way? Does the "empathy gym" make sense? Did you get a good "work out"? In light of these experiences, what is your view of the importance of practicing empathy? You can turn in your empathy report as an email attachment to me, with your real name!