Lower Levels Of Empathy Research Articles

Cross-national Psychometric Evaluation of the Jefferson Scale of Empathy-Medical Student Version.

This study aimed to examine the factorial structure of the Jefferson Scale of Empathy-Medical student version (JSE-S) and assess items' discriminatory ability at higher and lower empathy levels in medical student populations from different countries and languages. JSE-S datasets were retrieved from previous studies of 4113 first- and/or second-year medical students from Switzerland, Portugal, Italy, Brazil, France, Spain, New Zealand, UK, Ireland, Mexico, and Peru. Parallel principal component analyses and item response theory were applied. Excluding item 18, the Compassionate Care subscale emerged in five samples (Switzerland, Portugal, Italy, France and UK/Ireland), Perspective Taking in three (Switzerland, Portugal and UK/Ireland) and Walking in Patient's Shoes in five (Switzerland, Portugal, Spain, UK/Ireland and Mexico/Peru). All subscales had items providing overlapping information. The JSE-S subscales had reliable high test performance at low empathy levels, while when the JSE-S increased, the standard error also increased. There was no consistent support across countries for the JSE-S three-factorial structure. Items provided redundant information and discriminatory power decreased when aiming to differentiate students at high empathy levels. A JSE-S revision to improve cross-cultural comparability, results' generalizability and validity should focus on suppressing or reformulating items that cannot differentiate medical students' empathy.

The interconnection between social media addiction, alexithymia and empathy in medical students.

This study explores whether high alexithymia values correlate with low levels of empathy, while also trying to identify potential connections with social media addiction. We hypothesized that alexithymia mediates the relationship between social media addiction and empathy levels in a sample of undergraduate students. The study population consisted of 649 medical students in the 4th/5th/6th University year, recruited between March and May 2021. For this assessment, we employed three psychometric instruments: the Toronto Empathy Questionnaire (TEQ), the Social Media Addiction Scale-Student Form (SMAS-SF), and the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20). A pathway analysis investigated alexithymia as a mediator between social media addiction and the degree of empathy in medical undergraduates. Sobel's test and the Baron and Kenny approach were used for testing mediation. The TEQ total mean score was 48.76 ± 5.65, while the TAS-20 total mean score was 47.71 ± 11.49. Further analysis of the TAS-20 scale scores showed that 21.42% of students had possible alexithymia, while 14.02% had clear alexithymia. The SMAS-SF total mean score was 73.20 ± 14.59. None of the students reported levels consistent with major social media addiction. The mediated effect of the TAS-20 is about 1.3 times larger than the direct effect of the SMAS-SF on TEQ. We found a significant negative correlation between empathy and alexithymia in medical students. Alexithymia was a mediator between social media addiction and empathy. Therefore, we recommend further efforts to identify potential levels of alexithymia in medical students, in order to successfully develop tailored interventions aimed at increasing their emotional awareness.

Declining empathy trends throughout medical curriculum and association factors of low empathy among medical students and residents: a single center study

BackgroundA physician’s empathy level substantially impacts clinical competence, patient relationships, and treatment outcomes. Yet, understanding empathy trends from medical students to resident doctors within a single institution is limited. This study delves into empathy trends within a single-center academic setting and identifies factors associated with low empathy.MethodsThis cross-sectional study enrolled the second—to sixth-year medical students of Phramongkutklao College of Medicine and the first—to second-year residents at Phramongkutklao Hospital. It utilized a standardized questionnaire covering demographics, family relationships, the Maudsley Personality Inventory (MPI), and the Jefferson Scale of Empathy (JSE). The relationship between variables and JSE scores was analyzed using independent t-test, one-way ANOVA, and Chi-square tests. Multivariable logistic and linear regression analyses examined associated factors and trends across educational levels. A quadratic term was incorporated to evaluate the presence of a nonlinear trend.ResultsA total of 520 participants, comprising 189 (36.4%) preclinical students, 153 (29.4%) clinical students, and 178 (34.2%) residents, completed the survey. The JSE showed a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.83. The average empathy score was 103.8 ± 15.0, with 27.1% of low empathy levels. Specialty preference and sex-adjusted average empathy scores decreased from 114.5 (95%CI: 112.0–117.0) among second-year medical students to 95.2 (95%CI: 92.2–98.2) among second-year residents (Pnon−linear<0.001). The adjusted proportion of low empathy is highest among sixth-year medical students (54.4%, 95%CI: 34.4–73.2%). Factors associated with low empathy included those preferring procedure-oriented specialties (AOR: 4.16, 95%CI: 1.54–11.18) and a higher parental income (AOR: 2.97, 95%CI: 1.09 to 8.10). Subgroup analysis revealed that residents with a GPAX above 3.5 and those in technology-oriented specialties were also associated with lower empathy (AOR: 3.46, 95%CI: 1.40–8.59 and AOR: 2.93, 95%CI: 1.05–8.12, respectively).ConclusionA declining empathy trend was observed among medical students, which then plateaued among residents. Additionally, residents in technology-oriented specialties may require empathy enhancements due to their ongoing patient consultations. Addressing these issues requires collaborative planning between students and teachers to foster empathy throughout the medical curriculum.

Empathy among autistic and non-autistic adolescents: The importance of informant effects.

Empathy is the ability to recognize the emotions of others (cognitive empathy) and to share in those emotions while maintaining a self-other distinction (emotional empathy). Previous research often, but not always, showed that autistic adults and children have lower levels of overall and cognitive empathy than non-autistic individuals. Yet how empathy manifests during adolescence, a developmental period marked by physiological, social, and cognitive change, is largely unclear. As well, we aimed to compare self versus parents' perceptions regarding adolescents' empathy. To do so, parents (N = 157) of 10-16-year-olds (N = 59 autistic) and their children (N = 133) completed empathy questionnaires. Adolescents also completed a measure of mental state recognition (Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test; RMET) and parents reported on their child's autistic traits. The tasks were completed twice ~six months apart. We found that autistic adolescents reported having lower empathic concern and higher personal distress than their non-autistic peers, whereas parents of autistic adolescents perceived them as having overall lower levels of empathy. Performance on the mental state recognition task of autistic and non-autistic adolescents' was comparable. The gap between self and parent reports regarding adolescents' empathy was explainable by parent-reported autistic traits, mainly communication difficulties. Empathy remains stable across the study's two time points. Thus, the findings do not support previous views of autistic people as having less empathy and these are possibly explainable by informant effects.

Empathy's Crucial Role: Unraveling Impact on Students Bullying Behavior - A Scoping Review.

Bullying behavior among students is a serious problem in the educational context and has an impact on victims and perpetrators. Bullying has serious impacts, both emotionally and psychologically, especially for victims who are vulnerable to stress, depression, and even in extreme cases, can lead to suicidal tendencies. Empathy is a key factor in responding to bullying situations. So empathy is an important aspect in reducing bullying behavior. The aim of this research is to explore the role of empathy in bullying behavior in students. The scoping review method was used in this research. The keywords used are empathy, bullying, and students. Search for articles in three databases, namely CINAHL, PubMed, and Scopus. The inclusion criteria in the article search were samples are students (elementary schools students until high schools students) English language, discussion of empathy, publication of articles in the last 10 years (2014-2023), and original research. Grey literature excluded in this scoping review. Data analysis using thematic analysis. The authors found 13 articles that discussed the influence of empathy on bullying behavior in students. Findings from the articles analyzed highlight the complexity of the interactions between affective and cognitive empathy and students behavior in the context of bullying. Students with high levels of empathy tend to be more active in defending victims of bullying, while low levels of empathy tend to reinforce bullying behavior or passive bystander attitudes. Intervention programs that include social and emotional skills training, awareness campaigns, and learning approaches that promote tolerance and respect for diversity can have the potential to reduce the incidence of bullying in students. Increasing understanding and empathetic responses can be an effective strategy in addressing bullying problems in schools and communities.

Interpretation bias for ambiguous scenarios among individuals with high and low levels of empathy

AbstractEmpathy is the ability to understand and resonate with the emotions of others, typically requiring individuals to infer others' emotional status through the information around them. However, this information is often ambiguous and it is unknown whether individuals with high empathy have a bias in interpreting contextual information. Therefore, this study investigated how individuals with low and high empathy interpret other‐relevant scenarios in Study 1 (N = 98) and self‐relevant scenarios in Study 2 (N = 95), by using the scenarios task and the Sentence Word Association Paradigm (SWAP) separately. Study 1 observed that, for interpretations of other‐relevant scenarios, the high‐empathy group showed greater likelihood ratings for negative interpretations than those with low‐empathy in both social and non‐social scenarios. Study 2 found that, for interpretations of self‐relevant scenarios, the high‐empathy group differed from the low‐empathy group only on non‐social scenarios but not on social scenarios. Specifically, individuals with high empathy were more likely to report a relationship between a negative word and an ambiguous scenario compared to those with low empathy in self‐relevant non‐social scenarios. The study first revealed a bias for highly empathetic individuals to regard the ambiguous scenarios as negative in other‐relevant and self‐relevant scenarios, except for self‐relevant social scenarios.

Working nurses' empathy with patients in public hospitals.

to determine the levels of empathy in professional nurses of a high-complexity hospital, to relate age to empathy (and each one of its dimensions), and to establish if there are differences between these levels according to the type of working schedules. comparative, correlational and cross-sectional design. The sample used (n=271) constituted 40.9% of the total number of nursing professionals. Psychometric properties of the Jefferson Scale of Empathy for Health Professionals were studied. Descriptive statistics were calculated: mean and standard deviation. The association between empathy and age was estimated using regression equations and statistical significance of the regression coefficients, after evaluating the type of curve using variance analysis. the underlying model of three dimensions of empathy was identified. The values of the descriptive statistics observed were relatively low in empathy and its dimensions. Empathy levels were not associated with the age range. No differences in empathy were found between the types of work schedules. Variability was found in the dimensions: "compassionate care" and "Walking on the patient's shoes". these results show that the levels of empathy observed may imply a deficient performance in empathetic care for patients. (1) The levels of empathy are low in the nursing professionals studied. (2) These levels are not associated with age and type of work performed. (3) Low levels of empathy could imply a negative alteration of humanized attention.

Understanding the Experiences of Patients with Sickle Cell Disease and Their Caregivers By Social Media Listening in the UK

INTRODUCTION: Sickle cell disease (SCD) is a life-long hereditary condition associated with reduced life expectancy and quality of life. 1 Long-term complications include high infection risk, stroke, severe anemia, organ damage, and vaso-occlusive crises. 1-2 In the United Kingdom (UK) there are ~20,000 patients with SCD. 3 Online conversations involving patients with chronic conditions can provide insight into their health-related concerns, caregiver experiences, and other stakeholder perspectives. 4 Here, we explore online conversations surrounding SCD to gain valuable information regarding real-world experiences and unmet needs. METHODS: A qualitative netnographic social media listening (SML) study was conducted in the UK using a search term syntax containing disease and treatment keywords, hashtags, and relevant website addresses. A 12-month historical search (1 Jun 2022-1 Jun 2023) was conducted using a third-party SML tool (TalkWalker), capturing all relevant SCD-related conversations across publicly accessible social media/digital channels including Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, forums, blogs, YouTube, and Facebook public pages. A sample of randomized data was sifted to isolate posts referencing the patient/caregiver experience for further analysis. Topics were identified from the sifted data using artificial intelligence (AI)-powered theme detection in natural language processing (NLP), manually grouped into common themes and quantified for prevalence and sentiment. Human-led qualitative analyses using keyword filtering and manual trawling were performed to contextualize and validate the findings. RESULTS: A total of 45,864 online posts with 687,302 engagements (i.e., likes, shares, comments, etc.) were captured. The sifted results yielded 513 posts (1.1%). Of these, 93% were from patients with SCD, and the remaining 7% were from caregivers and other sources. The largest number of posts came from Instagram (173 posts), followed by forums (123 posts), TikTok (123 posts), and Twitter (94 posts). NLP and qualitative sentiment analysis identified six overall themes: the experiences with management of SCD within the National Health Service, UK (72.5% [372/513] posts: 8.6% positive, 34.1% negative, 57.3% neutral), living with SCD and understanding the condition (70.8% [363/513] posts:13.2% positive, 41.3% negative, 45.5% neutral), the importance of community, support and family planning (60.6% [311/513] posts: 19.0% positive, 21.9% negative, 59.2% neutral), understanding the burden of SCD through accounts over lifetime (45.4% [233/513] posts: 17.6% positive, 26.6% negative, 55.8% neutral), talking about and raising awareness of SCD (40.9% [210/513] posts: 14.3% positive, 17.1% negative, 68.6% neutral), and access to/experiences with treatment (27.1% [139/513] posts: 6.5% positive, 29.5% negative, 64.0% neutral) ( Figure). The patient experience in accessing healthcare was striking, highlighting a lack of empathy from healthcare professionals (HCPs) and prejudice from those in primary/emergency care in providing care. Patients share their experiences of pain crises, their attempts to understand triggers, and the underestimation by HCPs of the real-life impact, leading to symptom dismissal and stigmatization associated with the need for painkillers. Importantly there is a strong outcry from patients with SCD and their community that current treatments are unsatisfactory, burdensome, or difficult to access. CONCLUSIONS:SML forms a valuable, novel, and quantifiable method of identifying challenges, unmet needs and capturing the patient's digital voice in SCD, adding to the evidence base in an under-researched area. Limited access to emergency care, low levels of empathy from HCPs, racial bias, and stigmatization reported by patients further highlight the presence of health inequity within this population. There is a pressing plea for the development and accessibility of improved treatments for this population. REFERENCES: 1. Lubeck D, et al. JAMA Netw Open 2019;2(11):e1915374. 2. Aljuburi G, et al. J Public Health (Oxf) 2013;35(4):510-7. 3. NHR Monthly Report. (June 2023). Available at: https://nhr.mdsas.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/NHR_Public_Report.pdf 4. Healthline Media; The DHC Group. (April 2023). Available at: https://healthlinemedia.com/assets/files/HealthlineMedia_Social_Health_Trends_Report_2023.pdf

The Association of "First 1000 Days of Life" Training Program on Communication Skill and Empathy of Undergraduate Medical Students: A Cross-Sectional Study.

1000 First Days of Life (1000FDL) training program is carried out for 2 years from the 3rd to 6th semester; in this program, students are asked to accompany pregnant women until their children are 2 years old. This study aimed to analyse undergraduate medical students' communication skills and empathy levels and determine the association between communication skills and empathy after the training program. This is a cross-sectional study in which 176 undergraduate medical students in Hasanuddin University participated; they were enrolled in 1000FDL training program and selected using purposive sampling. Data were collected using Modified Arabic Version of the ABIM's Patient Assessment (MAV-ABIM) and Jefferson Scale of Empathy - Student Version (JSE-S) questionnaires to assess their level of communication skills and empathy. In this study, demographic data were obtained using a semi-open-ended questionnaire. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics, Chi-Square, and Spearman tests. Communication skill was very good (83.5%), good (15.9%), and inadequate (0.6%), while the empathy level was high (9.1%), medium (25%), and low (65.9%). There was no significant difference between the level of communication skills (p-value 0.168) and empathy (p=0.145) based on gender, but there was a significant difference between <12 or >12 times interaction with the empathy level (p<0.001). The association between the level of communication showed that the level of empathy was significant (p<0.001, r=0.399). Undergraduate medical students had very good communication skills but low empathy levels. There was a positive association between communication skills and empathy level after the training program. The students' empathy level can be improved by increasing the frequency of interaction with patients in experiential learning through training programs.

Grey-matter correlates of empathy in 4-Repeat Tauopathies

Loss of empathy is an early and central symptom of frontotemporal lobar degeneration spectrum diseases. We aimed to investigate the topographical distribution of morphometric brain changes associated with empathy in Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP) and Corticobasal Syndrome (CBS) patients. Twenty-seven participants with CBS and 31 with PSP were evaluated using Interpersonal Reactivity Index scales in correlation with gray matter atrophy using a voxel-based morphometry approach. Lower levels of empathy were associated with an increased atrophy in fronto-temporal cortical structures. At subcortical level, empathy scores were positively correlated with gray matter volume in the amygdala, hippocampus and the cerebellum. These findings allow to extend the traditional cortico-centric view of cognitive empathy to the cerebellar regions in patients with neurodegenerative disorders and suggest that the cerebellum may play a more prominent role in social cognition than previously appreciated.

Empathy in competencies of specific norms in Obstetrics students from Ica universities - 2022

Introduction: For over a century, educational policies have vigorously promoted competency-based education in higher education students. Objective: It was proposed to determine the incidence of empathy in the competencies of specific norms of Obstetrics students at universities in Ica. Methods: There was a quantitative approach, a non-experimental correlational-causal design; The sample consisted of 101 female students in the last year of the Faculty of Obstetrics. The instrument was the personal reactivity questionnaire (first variable) and, for the second variable, the observation technique and performance checklist. Results: The results revealed that 67.33% of the students presented a low level of empathy; 58.4% had a low level of cognitive empathy; 75.2% had a low level of affective empathy; Regarding the competency standards, 86.14% did not comply with the competencies, of this, in the care of pregnant women and unborn children, 7.9% complied with them. In the dimension of caring for women and couples, 16.8% complied. Conclusion: Empathy significantly affected the competencies of specific norms in students evaluated, suggesting the need to strengthen this soft skill to improve the competitiveness of future obstetric professionals.

Triarchic psychopathy and affective picture processing: An event-related potential study

Psychopathy and its precursors appear to be associated with abnormal affective response. For example, individuals high in psychopathy show reduced psychophysiological response to unpleasant stimuli, which might explain low levels of empathy in psychopathic individuals, and their pursuit of individual goals without regard for others’ wellbeing. In keeping with the notion that psychopathology is best represented on a continuum, the triarchic model suggests that psychopathy is characterized by elevations on three traits: boldness, meanness and disinhibition. Understanding how these traits relate to psychophysiological response to emotional stimuli would help validate the triarchic model, while also bridging to other psychopathological spectra (e.g., internalizing psychopathology, which is characterized by low boldness). Here, N = 123 young adults passively viewed unpleasant, pleasant and neutral pictures while subjective and electrocortical response were recorded. Controlling for the other triarchic traits, individuals with higher self-reported meanness had smaller late positive potentials (LPPs) to both pleasant and unpleasant pictures, whereas individuals higher in boldness had larger LPPs to unpleasant pictures. In addition, those higher in meanness rated unpleasant pictures as more pleasant and less emotionally arousing. Disinhibition was not associated with the LPP or ratings. Meanness appears to drive blunted response to unpleasant pictures that has previously been observed among those high on psychopathy, and may also be associated with reduced engagement with generic pleasant stimuli. Moreover, results converge with prior work on other traits of transdiagnostic relevance (e.g., extraversion), as well as internalizing symptoms, providing a bridge between psychopathy and other forms of psychopathology.

Direct and indirect effects of social dominance orientation on hate speech perpetration via empathy and moral disengagement among adolescents: A multilevel mediation model.

Although it is known that social dominance orientation directly affects hate speech perpetration, few studies have explored the mechanisms by which this effect takes place during adolescence. Based on the socio-cognitive theory of moral agency, we aimed to fill this gap in the literature by exploring the direct and indirect effects of social dominance orientation on hate speech perpetration in offline and online settings. The sample included seventh, eigth, and ninth graders (N = 3225) (51.2% girls, 37.2% with an immigrant background) from 36 Swiss and German schools who completed a survey about hate speech, social dominance orientation, empathy, and moral disengagement. A multilevel mediation path model revealed that social dominance orientation had a direct effect on offline and online hate speech perpetration. Moreover, social dominance also had indirect effects via low levels of empathy and high levels of moral disengagement. No gender differences were observed. Our findings are discussed regarding the potential contribution to preventing hate speech during adolescence.

Empathy and behavior in children affected by autism spectrum disorders.

Many studies have already shown that individuals suffering from autism spectrum disorders (ASD) present low levels of empathy: in fact, reduced emotional reciprocity is considered a clinically significant indicator of autistic functioning. We decided to investigate the role of empathy in determining pathological behaviors in children affected by ASD considering parents' point of view; and to evaluate the presence of differences between mothers and fathers' perception of their child's empathy and behaviors. We compared empathy levels in a sample of 58 patients with ASD as reported by a parent-filled questionnaire with the results of a global evaluation conducted by means of play observations, clinician-rated scales, a semistructured interview with both caregivers and parent-filled questionnaires. The majority of ASD patients have low levels of empathy according to both parents' points of view; noteworthy, mothers and fathers are highly concordant in this respect. Children's levels of empathy negatively correlate with many behavioral problems, both internalizing and externalizing. Furthermore, we found that mothers tend to perceive more internalizing problems, while fathers are more willing to notice externalizing ones. Involving both caregivers in children's diagnostic assessment could deepen patient's evaluation and finally the therapeutic results. Mothers and fathers seem to be highly consistent in describing the psychological characteristics of their child, but not in respect to symptoms.

Implicit weight stigma and bullying perpetration in college students: The mediating role of explicit weight stigma and moral disengagement and the moderating role of empathy

AbstractThe current study aims to examine the mediational effects of explicit weight stigma and moral disengagement (MD) and moderating effects of empathy on the relationship between implicit weight stigma and bullying perpetration. Two hundred and twenty‐eight college students (112 men, mean age of 19.89 ± 1.82 years) completed implicit (the Single Category Implicit Association Test) and explicit (the development of the weight stigma scale) measures of weight stigma, and responded to questionnaires regarding MD, empathy, and bullying perpetration. Structural equation modeling was conducted and mediating effects were tested using AMOS 17.0 software. The results indicated that implicit weight stigma significantly predicted bullying perpetration. After controlling for gender, this association was jointly mediated by explicit weight stigma and MD. Furthermore, empathy moderated the relationship between implicit weight stigma and bullying perpetration. Specifically, college students who have high levels of implicit weight stigma and low levels of empathy would score higher on the bully questionnaire. These findings may provide a possible explanation for when and how implicit weight stigma relates to bullying perpetration.

I'd better say something! How empathy shapes bystander psychological reactance and intervention to online trolling of service organizations

PurposeOnline trolling is a detrimental behavior for consumers and service businesses. Although online trolling research is steadily increasing, service research has yet to thoroughly explore how this behavior impacts businesses. Further, the role of bystanders, consumers who witness a victim (business) being trolled, remains largely unexplored. The purpose of this paper is thus to introduce online trolling to the service literature and begin to identify when (types of online troll content) and why (empathy and psychological reactance) bystanders are likely to intervene and support a service business being trolled by posting positive eWOM.Design/methodology/approachThis research uses a two-study (Study 1 n = 313; Study 2 n = 472) experimental design with scenarios of a service business experiencing online trolling (moral versus sadistic). Participants' responses as bystanders were collected via an online survey.FindingsResults reveal bystanders are more likely to post positive eWOM to support a service organization experiencing sadistic trolling. Psychological reactance is shown to mediate the relationship between trolling type and positive eWOM. Further, spotlight analysis demonstrates that bystanders with higher levels of empathy are more likely to post positive eWOM, whereas bystanders with low levels of empathy are likely to have a significantly higher level of psychological reactance.Originality/valueThis research is among the first in the service literature to specifically explore the consumer misbehavior of online trolling. Further, it provides new perspectives to online trolling by probing the role of bystanders and when and why they are likely to support service organizations being trolled.

The more the better? The negative effect of disseminators' donations in online donation

AbstractOnline donation platforms often present information regarding disseminators' donations to stimulate donations, but it is unclear how it affects potential donors' behavior. This paper examines how disseminators' donation amounts impact potential donors' donation likelihood. The findings of six studies show that potential donors are less (vs. more) likely to contribute to unfamiliar initiators when disseminators contribute large (vs. small) amounts. The following psychological response drives the effect: when potential donors observe disseminators contribute more, they infer that disseminators have assumed greater responsibility and thus reduce their perceived responsibility to the unfamiliar initiator. We also confirm the boundary conditions of tie strength and empathy. This effect is significant when donors have low levels of empathy or strong ties with the disseminator. In contrast, this effect is reversed when tie strength is high and attenuated when potential donors have high levels of empathy. Our research enriches the literature concerning the effects of others' donations and online donation and provides managerial guidance to enable the success of online donation projects.

‘Struggling to appear normal’: a moderated mediational analysis of empathy and camouflaging in the association between autistic traits and depressive symptoms

Background Camouflaging or camouflaging autistic traits—strategies that hide social impairments to match societal norms—has been linked to empathy and depressive symptoms in autism research. Much epidemiological evidence has further revealed that characteristics of autism and autistic traits are distributed continuously throughout the general population. Nonetheless, the relationship between these variables in the Chinese general population is unclear. Method The present study aimed to elucidate the relationships between autistic traits, empathy, camouflaging, and depressive symptoms in a subclinical sample of 1215 Chinese university students of ages 18–27, using self-report assessments. Results Correlational analysis revealed that autistic traits, camouflaging, and depressive symptoms were significantly intercorrelated. Empathy was significantly correlated with autistic traits and camouflaging. Mediation analysis revealed that camouflaging mediated the positive link between autistic traits and depressive symptoms. Moderated mediation analysis further indicated that the first stage mediated path (autistic traits → camouflaging) was weaker for students with lower levels of empathy. Conclusions The results suggest that camouflaging is a key contributor in the positive association between autistic traits and depressive symptoms, and that empathy help stimulate the development and maintenance of camouflaging.

Victim Blaming and Non-Consensual Forwarding of Sexts Among Late Adolescents and Young Adults.

This study explored late adolescents' and young adults' willingness to engage in non-consensual forwarding of sexts (NCFS) and its relation to victim blaming beliefs toward female and male victims. The study further examined important determinants in the development of victim blaming beliefs (e.g., perceived victim blaming of peers). An online survey was conducted among 1343 Belgian respondents of which 78.4% were female (Mage = 21.62years, SD = 3.57years). Structural equation modeling showed that victim blaming beliefs (i.e., responsibility-based and characteristic-based) were related to willingness to engage in NCFS, which was related to NCFS, regardless of the victim's sex. Further, victim blaming beliefs in the context of NCFS were shaped by parents' and peers' perceived victim blaming, and respondents' high levels of narcissism and low levels of empathy. Surprisingly, pornography use was negatively correlated with characteristic-based victim blaming beliefs. Additionally, males and late adolescents appeared to hold more victim blaming beliefs toward female and male victims in comparison with females and young adults. Lastly, the willingness to engage in NCFS was more strongly related to responsibility-based victim blaming (not characteristic-based victim blaming) if the victim was male. The findings demonstrate how victim blaming encourages NCFS and emphasize that educational programs should avoid victim-focused strategies.

Implicações da empatia nas funções executivas dos estudantes com problemas de coexistência escolar

Introduction: executive functions are the set of cognitive skills necessary to control and self-regulate behavior, and empathy is the ability to emotionally understand what others feel. Both variables interact with each other to regulate aggressive behaviors, thus low levels of empathy and poor performance in executive functions have been associated with different difficulties in school coexistence, including bullying. Objective: this study examined the role of empathy and executive functions in a population of students between 12-17 years old, belonging to a private educational institution in the municipality of Bello, Antioquia. Methodology: the research was descriptive and cross-sectional in scope. Questionnaires on school coexistence, prosocial behavior, and instruments to assess executive functions such as the TMT part B, the Stroop and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test were applied. Results: it was evidenced that there is an association between low empathy and deficiencies in the performance of executive functions, and a relationship between adequate levels of empathy and good performance in executive functions, in the sample of students evaluated. Conclusions: a high level of empathy in prosocial students is related to better executive processing in selective attention, conflict resolution, and inhibitory control.