Aspergers/Autism nd feeling empathy

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Empathy in this context can be broken down into a 4-part process:

(1) recognizing another person's emotions: many people on the spectrum have issues with Theory of the Mind and may fail to recognize the emotional states of other people;

--I recognize only the most blatantly outward displays of emotion. Sometimes I also relate to a situation and remember how I felt in the same situation (e.g., seeing someone get bullied)

(2) understanding another person's emotions: if a person on the spectrum recognizes another person's emotions, he/she may understand it cognitively, as opposed to emotionally

-- Here is where it really falls apart for me. I have a cynical/analytical reaction to most emotional people. If I don't understand the reason for their emotions, then I cannot relate.

(3) having an appropriate emotional reaction: if a person on the spectrum recognizes and emotionally understands another person's emotion, he/she still may not experience the emotion;

-- I have a narrow emotional range and my mind has to be in the right place (e.g., not overly focused on an obsession) before I can experience one of those emotions. Even then, the emotion has to be one I can relate to, and I have to understand the reasons for their emotion. If I don't cognitively agree, then it won't register with me.

(4) displaying an appropriate emotional response: even if a person on the spectrum does recognize, understand and experience the emotion, the emotion might not be outwardly displayed

-- I don't wear my emotions on my sleeve.

check out dr. doolittle (original); he has AS, for sure, and observe the way he makes attempts to relate to people/ or not.
He approaches it cognitively.

great flick.

I am an empath.
I can sense feelings and emotions from everyone within the area.

I have Asperger's, but it is fairly mild and does not interfere a lot with how I function in everyday life. I am also an empath and can literally feel what other people are feeling, even if they do not show it. Even if I do know how someone is really feeling, I have a difficult time expressing it, especially in face-to-face communication.

I also have what would be considered way too much empathy for normal.
I can't even watch true-life movies as they are too upsetting when bad things happen. O.O

Like everything else in Aspergers, the empathy thing is on a spectrum. You can have too little or too much I was told when I was diagnosed.

I am one who is good with empathy.

Aspies do have Empathy. The notion that we have problems with empathy is derived from a sadly common and stupidly narrow understanding of "empathy" to mean "NT nonverbal emotional signals".

Hi guys I'm new hear but I would like to reply. I was diagnosed as having PDD-Nos at 21 but I always knew that i was different. I have felt empathy before in a very profound way at least to characters in books, movies, anime and to the september 11 victims. I personally define empathy and being able to have a sudden and profound awareness that you are connect to another person. It almost like having a religious moment. It seems like your so totally connected that your actually the same person. When that person cries you cry. When that person has a victory you have a victory. Even though it can be painful it can be incredible to feel. I think this is way it is so fun to go and watch a movie.

The bizzare thing is that I can no longer feel empathy and love to be able to get it back I just don't know how. With out my empathy I feel like a soulless wind up doll. For the longest time I felt I was a monster for not having it but I slowly realized that i can't beat my self up over for the rest of my life there nothing the psychologist can do right now for me so I just wait for oxytocin to release and maybe that could help to feel a connection to people again. With empathy reading nonfictions becomes very boring and unsatisfying.

I can' t feel epathy for other human beings but I wonder if it's because I choose not to. I'm often labled one of those "Peta freaks" because I am one of those people who values animals more than humans. If you were to walk in my shoes, then you might understand. Go ahead, call me a Peta freak or Petatard. It's only evil people who see animals as inamate objects to do whatever the hell we please with and not worry about if they can feel pain or fear. The only reason people like me are called these names is because most people do not give a damb at all about animals. Well, I don't give a damb about your people. So there!

I have empathy, but only for certain things. I have empathy for my friends, "disabled" people, and social misfits, but I can't empathize with most people I know. I can't understand why it's so important to look young, or why people have to gossip. I also have empathy for shelter dogs and the Haitians, because they have a lot of problems going on, and we should care more about them...and I also have empathy for anime characters. My favorite character is always being called cold by certain people. He just doesn't like to talk, and he doesn't trust certain people because in the manga, his only friend was killed.

Thanks Thoughtcrimes for starting this topic back then - i'd love to know where you're at now? Did you get a diagnoses? What do you think about the whole empathy thing now?

I'm in a similar situation. I suspect i have Aspergers and have done an on-line test. However, i think of myself as empathetic. I've also done an online test for empathy and scored really, really low. Yet i feel like i know how to listen and sympathise, i feel for people in tragedies on the news and have always been involved in anti-poverty movements etc.

I know that on line tests may not be accurate, but i wonder if the root of all this is in the definition of empathy. I lead an ethical lifestyle and friends come to me with their problems, but may be this is just an intellectual choice of mine?? Though - i do feel other's pain so i'm not sure about that.

Or may be there is confusion between caring about others - being upset because others are suffering, and knowing what others are feeling by watching their body language, facail expression etc??

Can anyone shed any more light?


(I appreciated the post somewhere in this thread which said that it does not matter whether the person feels the pain of others, but whether they do something about it.)

see my blog entry:

http://www.wrongplanet.net/modules.php? ... &jid=15065

his work comes back repeatedly to these topics of Private Language &/or Other Minds, but it all boils down to the question of empathy & what that might mean.