What is the difference between Sympathy and Empathy?

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What is the difference between empathy and sympathy?

Sympathy is seeing and understanding someone else's feelings.
Empathy is sharing and experiencing someone else's feelings.

I'll go a step further and say that sympathy does not require empathy. Sympathy is that you can recognize that another person is suffering in some way, and you feel for that person because you know they are suffering, even if you cannot relate or understand why.

Empathy is the ability to relate, to put yourself in the shoes of another and imagine what that hurt would truly feel like. My husband can empathize with what I felt when I was bullied in school because he was also bullied. He knows how it felt.

Sometimes I think people with autism are more capable of empathy than sympathy, because they often struggle with being able to understand another person's point of view. My husband is very empathetic about situations he has experienced, or has some reference point for. In matters he has not experienced, his simple answer is typically "get over it" because he cannot understand why someone would feel a certain way. In other words, he often lacks sympathy, but is good at empathy if he has "been there".

I think I understand: So sympathy is understanding that another being is being negatively impacted and empathy is experiencing the same negative impact as the victim although it has neither benefit or detriment to you. And you can have sympathy without empathy.

What about empathy without sympathy?

So would thinking it is bad to hurt animals when you see a mistreated animal be empathy or sympathy?

I believe it would be empathy, you would know that it would be hurtful and mean, you would almost feel what the animal would feel..I have great empathy for others, but I struggled for years to finally truly understand the difference...When someone died, I would send a sympathy card, as I was sad for their loss..Did I feel their same loss though? No, but I knew the emptiness would be ahead for them, the difficulty without their love beside them in life. The news about the Austrian daughter who was held captive for so long brought me to tears,if anyone questioned empathy, this one would show what empathy towards another means literally, my heart hurts for all she has been through.

I think sympathy without empathy is more likely, though I wouldn't rule out the other way around.

As far as the animal being mistreated, it would depend. Do you see it's wound, recall a wound you had, and understand what the animal must feel? That would be empathy. Or is it simply that you know it must hurt and you feel a compassion for the suffering of another living being? That would be sympathy.

Actually empathy and sympathy are synonyms for each other, so they're quite closely related and there is considerable overlap.

This is always an interesting topic......... My daughter took medical training in school, and one of the discussions was that they needed empathy in the nursing field, but that sympathy was not to be confused with it, as sympathy is more of pity.Whoa. Does that make sense? To know that a needle is going to hurt, so to be careful and delicate with it, this shows empathy. To jab a needle without concern is certainly lacking in empathy.But why is sympathy like pity? "Poor thing, I would hate to be in her shoes", kind of thinking?

Not always the best source of info but for our purposes I believe it does pretty well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empathy

It always bugs me when people tell me they feel bad for me, yet they have never been through what I have, and cannot relate to me. They try, but they just don't understand. So I guess the majority of people would lack empathy towards me.

If I understand this right, empathy is a genuine understanding of what the other person is going/has went through and means a lot more to people.

I'm really confused....I thought sympathy was like pity but not not as judgemental. (methinks pity="poor *pathetic* person, they are so far below the however-much-better place I'm at, I should patronize them" .....whereas sympathy="oh my I'm sorry for that person, that's awful, maybe I should offer comfort") And I thought empathy was like where you recognize the other person's emotions well enough that you feel what you think you recognize, based on feelings you know from past experience or how you imagine you'd feel if you were the other person.....It's really hard to figure out or express the difference and I'm confusing myself@

Empathy: an emotional lie, i.e., you feel the emotion of the other even though you haven't been where they've been that causes said emotion

Sympathy: an emotional similarity, i.e., you feel the emotion of another for you've been to similar places that induce said emotion

Nearly all individuals with an ASD will have an impairment of the former.

(People often confuse care and compassion for empathy; it's not at all.)

Daniel, empathy confuses the hell out of me. Just the term itself. I've heard so many definitons. The one you just mentioned is the one that I thought empathy meant because of the term Empath.

Then I hear that empathy also means you can relate to someone's situation because you have been there too?

That's sympathy.

I know I feel sympathy as if I see someone with an ASD in an uncomfortable situation, i.e., unable to find words and then stuttering for an unplanned question was asked, I then feel uncomfortable.

For me sympathy is when youve been in the same situation and empathy is when you can apply similar feelings to a different situation.

Example

Your fish dies. I had a fish die. Thats sympathy

Your dog dies. I had a fish die. I take my feelings of loss at my fish and apply them to guess how you are feeling at the loss of your dog.

Empathy does require effort. But i think we aspies could do well with it because weve gone through so much crap, we can relate.

How can you know what emotion the other is feeling if you haven't been there? I suppose you could try to imagine what they might be feeling and think "you might be feeling a negative emotion - I aknowledge your emotion" Would that be empathy or sympathy?

To me it is stupid: if another is hurt and empathy means you feel what the other is feeling then empathy is a bad thing because you are hurt needlessly. It is illogical to hurt yourself purposefully.

Empathy is why people cry when they watch movies. Totally illogical.

Your example would be using deductive reasoning; you recognize the emotion that someone may be experiencing, but you don't actually share the feelings with them (yep, it's totally weird how people do such).