Empathy begins at home: How you can support your child's development of compassion and understanding

For many of us, the moment we see our child go over to help someone, without a prompt from us, brings a glow of pride. We want our children to be kind to other people, and for everyone to see just how wonderful our child really is – showing this kind of concern for someone else is harder than it looks. And you have an important role to play in helping your child master the skills they need to be truly empathetic.  

Social psychologists talk about prosocial behaviour, which are the things we do for someone else – things like helping, sharing, giving gifts and cooperating with one or more people.  

Sometimes, we behave in these ways without expecting any kind of reward, this is known as altruism, and at other times we do these things because they will make us feel better, to avoid punishment or maybe because we think if we do something for someone else they will do something for us.^[1]  

There are a mixture of reasons why your child might show this concern for others – some are linked to motivations that come from within and others from factors outside of themselves.  

Researchers think the motivations from within are linked to empathy, which is when your child notices and understands someone else’s emotion and relates to that feeling.^[1]  

Brene Brown describes empathy as “feeling with other people.”^[2] 

Sympathy, on the other hand, is when your child notices someone is upset or needs something and feels sorry or concerned for them – your child doesn’t experience the same emotion but recognises it.^[1] 

Both empathy and sympathy can lead to prosocial behaviours, and some researchers suggest sympathy is likely to develop sooner than empathy.  

Just like lots of your child’s development, empathy and sympathy is affected by several things, including your child’s temperament, their knowledge and ability to understand their own emotions, and their experiences.^[1]  

Your role in supporting your child to develop empathy is really important – and links to how you respond to them.  

Researchers talk about parental warmth – this is your supportive, affectionate and responsive interactions with your child.^[1]  

When you support your child, show affection and notice and respond to their thoughts and feelings, you help them to develop empathy and sympathy. Being sensitive to your child’s needs and responding to them is another important part of helping your child respond to other people’s needs.^[1] 

Simply put, your child develops empathy, care and concern for others by experiencing that themselves from the people close to them.  

That might sound really easy – but we all know it can be hard to understand your child’s total devastation at being picked up from nursery by one parent when they expected the other, or their frustration when they can’t get the block exactly where they want it on the model they’re building.  

While as an adult, these things might not seem that important to you, recognising and acknowledging that these emotions are real and important to your child will help them to do this for others as they grow.  

Finally, involving your child in household tasks and noticing and praising their prosocial actions seems to encourage more of this behaviour – in contrast, giving things as ‘rewards’, like a sticker or present if they do something you're proud of, seems to be associated with less prosocial behaviour later.^[1] 

References: 

[1] Spinrad, T.L. & Dal, D.E. (2018). Fostering prosocial behavior and empathy in young children. Current Opinion in Psychology, 20, 40-44.  

[2] RSA (2013). Brene Brown on Empathy. Available on YouTube