IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/palcom/v7y2020i1d10.1057_s41599-020-00581-0.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The impact of empathy and perspective-taking instructions on proponents and opponents of immigration

Author

Listed:
  • Olga M. Klimecki

    (University of Geneva
    University of Geneva
    University of Geneva
    Clinical Psychology and Behavioral Neuroscience, Technische Universität Dresden)

  • Matthieu Vétois

    (University of Geneva
    University of Geneva)

  • David Sander

    (University of Geneva
    University of Geneva)

Abstract

In many societies, immigration is a conflictual topic, leading to heated exchanges between proponents and opponents of immigration. Such debates on immigration might benefit from the engagement of the discussants in empathy and perspective taking. Although empathy and perspective-taking exercises can be beneficial in some contexts, previous research shows marked differences in people with a rightist versus a leftist political orientation when it comes to their motivation to engage in empathy. The degree to which this applies to perspective taking and to the context of debates on immigration has not yet been tested. The current study, conducted in Switzerland, tested how proponents or opponents of immigration react to instructions for empathy and perspective taking in debates on immigration. The results reveal that, compared with participants in the control condition who had no instructions, proponents of immigration who received instructions were more motivated or willing to engage in empathy and perspective taking. Furthermore, proponents of immigration showed decreases in their positive and negative emotions under the perspective-taking instructions. Conversely, for opponents of immigration, perspective-taking instructions increased their perception of other’s competitiveness compared with participants in the control condition. Taken together, these results underline the importance of taking an individual’s views on immigration into account when implementing interventions for conflict resolution in immigration-related issues.

Suggested Citation

  • Olga M. Klimecki & Matthieu Vétois & David Sander, 2020. "The impact of empathy and perspective-taking instructions on proponents and opponents of immigration," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 7(1), pages 1-12, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:7:y:2020:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-020-00581-0
    DOI: 10.1057/s41599-020-00581-0
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41599-020-00581-0
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/s41599-020-00581-0?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Susanne Leiberg & Olga Klimecki & Tania Singer, 2011. "Short-Term Compassion Training Increases Prosocial Behavior in a Newly Developed Prosocial Game," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 6(3), pages 1-10, March.
    2. Olga M Klimecki & Patrik Vuilleumier & David Sander, 2016. "The Impact of Emotions and Empathy-Related Traits on Punishment Behavior: Introduction and Validation of the Inequality Game," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(3), pages 1-20, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Magdalena Adamus & Matúš Grežo, 2023. "Attitudes towards migrants and preferences for asylum and refugee policies before and during Russian invasion of Ukraine: The case of Slovakia," MUNI ECON Working Papers 2023-01, Masaryk University, revised Feb 2024.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Thomas Baumgartner & Anne Saulin & Grit Hein & Daria Knoch, 2016. "Structural Differences in Insular Cortex Reflect Vicarious Injustice Sensitivity," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(12), pages 1-9, December.
    2. Luis Ángel Pérula-de Torres & Juan Carlos Verdes-Montenegro-Atalaya & Elena Melús-Palazón & Leonor García-de Vinuesa & Francisco Javier Valverde & Luis Alberto Rodríguez & Norberto Lietor-Villajos & C, 2021. "Comparison of the Effectiveness of an Abbreviated Program versus a Standard Program in Mindfulness, Self-Compassion and Self-Perceived Empathy in Tutors and Resident Intern Specialists of Family and C," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(8), pages 1-16, April.
    3. Daniel Lim & Paul Condon & David DeSteno, 2015. "Mindfulness and Compassion: An Examination of Mechanism and Scalability," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(2), pages 1-8, February.
    4. Xinyue Wen & Ismaël Rafaï & Sébastien Duchêne & Marc Willinger, 2022. "Did Mindful People Do Better during the COVID-19 Pandemic? Mindfulness Is Associated with Well-Being and Compliance with Prophylactic Measures," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(9), pages 1-25, April.
    5. Chirag Dagar & Ashish Pandey & Ajinkya Navare, 2022. "How Yoga-Based Practices Build Altruistic Behavior? Examining the Role of Subjective Vitality, Self-transcendence, and Psychological Capital," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 175(1), pages 191-206, January.
    6. Amarjit Gill & Harvinder S. Mand & John D. Obradovich & Neil Mathur, 2017. "Influence of meditation on estate planning decisions: evidence from Indian survey data," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 3(1), pages 1-18, December.
    7. Daniel, Carole & Gentina, Elodie & Kaur, Tavleen, 2023. "Mindfulness and green purchase intention: A mediated moderation model uncovering the role of ethical self-identity," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
    8. Merguei, Nitzan & Strobel, Martin & Vostroknutov, Alexander, 2022. "Moral opportunism as a consequence of decision making under uncertainty," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 197(C), pages 624-642.
    9. Ladislau Bölöni & Taranjeet Singh Bhatia & Saad Ahmad Khan & Jonathan Streater & Stephen M Fiore, 2018. "Towards a computational model of social norms," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(4), pages 1-26, April.
    10. Guanlin Gao & Xinyan Shi, 2021. "Brief Mindfulness Meditation and Individual Contribution to Public Goods," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 41(3), pages 1303-1312.
    11. Shohfi, Thomas D. & White, Roger M., 2022. "Does native country turmoil predict immigrant workers’ honesty in markets?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 197(C), pages 150-164.
    12. Stefan Scherbaum & Maja Dshemuchadse & Susanne Leiberg & Thomas Goschke, 2013. "Harder than Expected: Increased Conflict in Clearly Disadvantageous Delayed Choices in a Computer Game," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(11), pages 1-7, November.
    13. Olga M Klimecki & Patrik Vuilleumier & David Sander, 2016. "The Impact of Emotions and Empathy-Related Traits on Punishment Behavior: Introduction and Validation of the Inequality Game," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(3), pages 1-20, March.
    14. John Zelenski & Sara Warber & Jake M. Robinson & Alan C. Logan & Susan L. Prescott, 2023. "Nature Connection: Providing a Pathway from Personal to Planetary Health," Challenges, MDPI, vol. 14(1), pages 1-23, March.
    15. Aymen Sajjad & Wahab Shahbaz, 2020. "Mindfulness and Social Sustainability: An Integrative Review," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 150(1), pages 73-94, July.
    16. Hafenbrack, Andrew C. & Cameron, Lindsey D. & Spreitzer, Gretchen M. & Zhang, Chen & Noval, Laura J. & Shaffakat, Samah, 2020. "Helping People by Being in the Present: Mindfulness Increases Prosocial Behavior," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 21-38.
    17. Helen Y Weng & Andrew S Fox & Heather C Hessenthaler & Diane E Stodola & Richard J Davidson, 2015. "The Role of Compassion in Altruistic Helping and Punishment Behavior," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(12), pages 1-20, December.
    18. Julie Bayle-Cordier & Loïc Berger & Rayan Elatmani & Massimo Tavoni, 2023. "Breath, Love, Walk? The Impact of Mindfulness Interventions on Climate Policy Support and Environmental Attitudes," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(13), pages 1-29, July.
    19. Lohmann, Paul M. & Gsottbauer, Elisabeth & You, Jing & Kontoleon, Andreas, 2023. "Anti-social behaviour and economic decision-making: Panel experimental evidence in the wake of COVID-19," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 136-171.
    20. Winnie W. S. Mak & Sin Man Ng & Emily W. S. Tsoi & Ben C. L. Yu, 2022. "Interconnectedness Is Associated with a Greater Sense of Civic Duty and Collective Action Participation through Transcendental Awareness and Compassion during COVID-19," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(12), pages 1-11, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:7:y:2020:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-020-00581-0. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.nature.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.