We tend to think of empathy as a uniquely human trait. With empathy being an attribute we exclusively thought to humans, you'd think that we'd empathize with each other before we did with any other species. This however is not true.
Last year there was a study done involving 240 men and women, most between the ages of 18 and 25 years old. Each participant was given a fictional news story involving the beating of a 1-year old baby, an adult in his 30's, a puppy or a 6-year old dog. After reading the story the participant was to rate how much empathy they had for the victim of the attack.
More empathy was shown for the child, the puppy and the adult dog than the adult human. Surprisingly, the study showed that the same amount of empathy was shown for the baby as the puppy.
Why? Why is it that more empathy was shown for an animal than for someone of our own species?
After giving this some thought I came to the conclusion that because the puppy and baby are helpless and unable to defend themselves, they derive more empathy from us than an adult who has is bigger, stronger and therefore more capable of defending himself.
I'm not sure how I feel about this study. I feel like a part of me agrees with the results. That the amount of empathy I feel would also be greater for the baby and puppy than for the human adult. The other part of me is mostly confused and I can't quite figure out what it is I'm confused about.
Empathy, weather it's a human trait just a human trait or not, is something that I think should be universal and should not be limited to race, religion, or species.
I agree with you, often at times when we see a child being hurt rather than an adult we would almost often always help the child rather than the adult. We tend to see adults are more than capable of defending themselves and that's why most people tend to walk away from a scene like that because we'll think that they'll be alright in the end. Empathy should be extended to everyone and I agree with you that it should be a universal thing.
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