Is empathy-induced helping due to self-other merging?

C. Daniel Batson, Karen Sager, Eric Garst, Misook Kang, Kostia Rubchinsky, Karen Dawson·1997·Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Abstract

Two experiments tested the idea that empathy-induced helping is due to self–other merging. To manipulate empathy, half of the participants in each experiment received instructions to remain objective while hearing about a young woman in need (low-empathy condition), and half received instructions to

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    Decety, Jean, Jackson, Philip L. · 2004 · Behavioral and Cognitive Neuroscience Reviews
  2. Putting the Altruism Back into Altruism: The Evolution of Empathy
    de Waal, Frans B.M. · 2008 · Annual Review of Psychology
  3. Emotion, regulation, and moral development
    Eisenberg, Nancy · 2000 · Annual Review of Psychology
  4. Compassion: an evolutionary analysis and empirical review
    Goetz, Jennifer L., Keltner, Dacher, Simon-Thomas, Emiliana · 2010 · Psychological Bulletin
  5. The Neural Substrate of Human Empathy: Effects of Perspective-taking and Cognitive Appraisal
    Lamm, Claus, Batson, C. Daniel, Decety, Jean · 2007 · Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience

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Cite CoChat for the checks on this page, and the paper for its own findings.

This page
CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Is empathy-induced helping due to self-other merging? https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1037//0022-3514.73.3.495
The paper
Batson, C. D., Sager, K., Garst, E., Kang, M., Rubchinsky, K., & Dawson, K. (1997). Is empathy-induced helping due to self-other merging? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.73.3.495

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