Investigating relationships among empathizers’ motivational state, stress, and affect as indices of empathic backfiring

On any given day, individuals encounter moments of frustration, disappointment, anger, or the like, and we rely on others’ empathy to process these experiences. Empathy allows us to resonate with and understand others’ emotional experiences (Decety & Lamm, 2006), in turn facilitating social support. Friendships are a critical context in which empathy takes place and although empathy benefits the receiver, it may backfire for empathizers, resulting in emotional distress, exhaustion, and burnout (Brown et al., 2021; Stoewen, 2019). In addition, an empathizer may be motivated to approach or withdraw from others based on the types of encountered emotions (Davidson, 1992; Harmon-Jones et al., 2013). Although, empathy is integral to promoting positive social relations, an open question remains: when does empathy backfire and can this backfiring be predicted? This study illuminates when, over the span of empathizing with others, motivational states predict empathic versus distressed behavioral responses, and whether these behaviors correspond to dysregulated autonomic and affective changes indicative of empathy backfiring.