Abstract
Self-compassion offers profound benefits to well-being and healthy psychological functioning. Surprisingly however, the relationship assumed between compassion for self and others has been questioned by recent research findings and is at best inconsistently correlated. The aim of this study is to throw further light on this debate by testing whether the association between self-compassion and compassion for others is moderated by authenticity amongst 530 participants who completed the Authenticity Scale, the Self-Compassion Scale, and the Compassion Scale. The results show that authenticity has a moderation effect on the association between self-compassion and the kindness, common humanity, mindfulness, and indifference subscales of the Compassion Scale. These results offer some initial insight into understanding the association between compassion for self and others and establish a case for researching the role of authenticity more thoroughly. The findings of this investigation call for further empirical attention to socially constructive aspects of authenticity and the development of new authenticity measurements that may better assess the interaction effect.
Highlights
In today’s world in which there are racially motivated murders, violence on the streets between people of different political views, and a culture of social media that promotes divisive messages, we need to cultivate a world in which we have more compassion for each other
Namely the non-significant correlation between ‘kindness’ and ‘accepting external influence’, all three subscales of the Authenticity Scale (AS) correlated with all six subscales of Compassion Scale (CS) in expected directions providing support that greater authenticity is associated with greater kindness, less indifference, greater common humanity, less separation, greater mindfulness and less disengagement
In order to address this intriguing issue, we hypothesized the possibility of relationship between self-compassion and compassion for others that is moderated by authenticity
Summary
In today’s world in which there are racially motivated murders, violence on the streets between people of different political views, and a culture of social media that promotes divisive messages, we need to cultivate a world in which we have more compassion for each other. In this study we investigate the association between self-compassion and other compassion and whether their relationship may be moderated by authenticity. Self-compassion has been empirically investigated in a growing body of psychological studies Given the inescapable nature of human suffering, it is thought that self-compassion can have a transformative positive psychological effect. Much research has documented the nature and personal benefits of self-compassion While many benefits have been reported for self-compassion, it has been assumed, intuitively, that such a tendency would be related to greater compassion for others. Research has questioned this assumption and recent literature has offered contradictory findings about the association between self-compassion and compassion for others
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