The 3 Types of Empathy: Emotional, Cognitive and Compassionate

Most people talk of empathy as if it is one thing.
But psychologists have long known that to be more nuanced.
Maybe you have found yourself in conversations where empathy has either been downplayed as something "feely feely"?
Or maybe you have experienced someone addressing the immense importance of empathy in a given situation, where you felt it was overplayed?
Watch the video to learn more, or read the key transcript below:
The official definition of “the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another” is a wide array of capabilities that we actually do have a language for - one that we can all learn.
Psychologists and researchers divide empathy into emotional, cognitive, and compassionate empathy.
Emotional empathy, also called affective empathy, is the ability to share another person’s feelings. This is an intuitively triggered feeling - like when you see the favorite character in a movie getting hurt.
Cognitive empathy, also called perspective-taking empathy, is one's ability to under decode and understand the emotions of others. Some researchers suggest this is more skill-like, whereas emotional empathy is more an inherent trait.
There is a difference between feeling how others would feel in a situation versus how you would feel. These two types of cognitive empathy are neurologically and psychologically different. Perspective-taking on others' behalf requires the most mental flexibility and the ability to set aside one's immediate emotions and feelings.
Many stop at that, but most modern research suggests a third type of empathy, which is compassionate empathy, also called empathic concern, which is the urge to want to help and relieve others of whatever bad they might be feeling.
Here are 5 critical takeaways I want you to have from this video:
Takeaway no. 1.
People without any empathy are really hard to work with. You don’t need all three of them, but some large studies have shown that lack of social sensitivity has a dramatic impact on team performance, so watch out for that.
Takeaway no. 2.
Remember that some feel what others feel, but do not undestand why they feel like they do. Others might understand why, but not feel it intuitively themselves. Some will have a strong urge to help others when in pain.
Takeaway no. 3.
Employees that are high in all three types of empathy are more likely to feel guilt or shame, and that is a strong motivational driver for many, but make sure to keep workload in check. Being available to feel what others are feeling and wanting to help 24/7 is a burdensome task.
Takeaway no. 4.
Being honest with yourself, as a leader, on where your strength lies is an incredibly important first step to becoming a better leader and using the skills you have to your advantage. There isn’t only one way to be a great leader, and real personal growth starts with honest self-realization.
Takeaway no. 5.
There are many platforms like Zoios that can help you regards of your natural strengths and weaknesses to heighten team cohesion, well-being and performance all at once, but it does require some effort on your end. Leadership is not easy, and most of the leaders that think leadership is easy are likely not great leaders… just naive leaders.