567941
research-article2015
ASMXXX10.1177/1073191114567941AssessmentVachon and Lynam
Article
Fixing the Problem With Empathy: Development and Validation of the Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy
Assessment 1–15 © The Author(s) 2015 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/1073191114567941 asm.sagepub.com
David D. Vachon1, and Donald R. Lynam2
Abstract Low empathy is a criterion for most externalizing disorders, and empathy training is a regular component of treatment for aggressive people, from school bullies to sex offenders. However, recent meta-analytic evidence suggests that current measures of empathy explain only 1% of the variance in aggressive behavior. A new assessment of empathy was developed to more fully represent the empathy construct and better predict important outcomes—particularly aggressive behavior and externalizing psychopathology. Across three independent samples (N = 210-708), the 36-item Affective and Cognitive measure of Empathy (ACME) was internally consistent, structurally reliable, and invariant across sex. The ACME bore significant associations to important outcomes, which were incremental relative to other measures of empathy and generalizable across sex. Importantly, the affective scales of the ACME—particularly a new “Affective Dissonance” scale— yielded moderate to strong associations with aggressive behavior and externalizing disorders. The ACME is a short, reliable, and useful measure of empathy. Keywords aggression, prosocial, externalizing, self-report, resonance, dissonance, antisocial The definition and conceptualization of empathy has varied considerably over the last 50 years (Batson, 2009; Wispé, 1987). Despite these definitional disagreements, however, assumptions regarding the importance of empathy are pervasive. A basic assumption regarding empathy is that it both facilitates prosocial behavior (Eisenberg & Miller, 1987) and inhibits antisocial behavior (Jolliffe & Farrington, 2004; Miller & Eisenberg, 1988). Individuals with high empathy understand how others feel, “cognitive empathy,” and vicariously experience their emotions, “affective empathy.” Thus, empathy is an investigative tool, allowing individuals to glean affective information through cognitive processes and emotional simulations. It is assumed that people with high empathy use this information to alleviate the suffering of others and avoid engaging in potentially harmful behavior, whereas people with low empathy cannot use such information to guide their behavior. As a result, perpetrators of antisocial behavior, violence, and rape are regularly described as having insufficient empathy (Miller & Eisenberg, 1988). Empathy also plays an important role in several externalizing syndromes included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th ed.; DSM-5; American Psychiatric Association, 2013), including conduct disorder, antisocial
personality disorder, and narcissistic personality disorder. The new trait model in Section III of DSM-5 further elevates the prominence of empathy; in Section III, empathy deficits are assumed to be core to all personality disorders. Empathy deficits also play a major role in psychopathy, a personality disorder characterized by chronic aggression and other forms of antisocial behavior (Cleckley, 1941/1988; Hare & Neumann, 2008). Empathy-externalizing research continues to flourish and clinical applications are widespread. For example, programs designed to increase empathy in offenders are a standard component of treatment in correctional settings, particularly in the treatment of sexual offenders (Marshall, 1999). More than $500 million each year is spent on therapy for sex offenders that has “victim awareness and empathy” training as its most frequent component (93% of men’s programs and 95% of women’s programs; McGrath, Cumming, 1
University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA
2
Corresponding Author: David D. Vachon, 701 N 2nd St., Suite 209, Minneapolis, MN 55401, USA. Email: [email protected]
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
2
Assessment
Burchard, Zeoli, & Ellerby, 2010). Empathy training is also a core feature of therapy programs outside correctional settings, including violence prevention curricula for elementary school students (Grossman et al., 1997), anger management therapy for youth (Pecukonis, 1990), and treatment for perpetrators of domestic violence (Fruzzetti & Levensky, 2000). But there is a problem with empathy. Despite assumptions regarding its importance to aggressive behavior, a recent meta-analysis by Vachon, Lynam, and Johnson (2014) suggests that empathy and aggression are virtually unrelated. Across all measures of empathy and aggression, empathy explained only 1% of the variance in aggression (average r = −.11). Prediction was also low across specific forms of aggression, including verbal aggression (4%), physical aggression (1%), and sexual aggression (1%). Vachon et al. offered two potential explanations for this small association: (a) the true association is weak, and expectations regarding the importance of empathy in aggressive behavior are unrealistic; (b) the true association between empathy and aggression is stronger but diminished by measurement problems. Vachon et al. advocated a variant of the second position, arguing that current conceptions of affective empathy are too narrow and fail to capture the full range of the construct. Specifically, traditional theories of affective empathy focus on how an individual’s feelings resonate with those of others. Scales range from a high level of resonance (empathy) to a low level of resonance (indifference). However, clinical descriptions of pathologically low empathy also include dissonant emotions, such as enjoyment of others’ misery and scorn for their emotional experiences. Construing affective empathy as a broader construct that includes such dissonant emotions could accommodate basic and clinical conceptualizations of empathy. Specifically, empathy can be extended beyond resonant responses (e.g., empathy, sympathy, compassion) to include a lack of response (e.g., callous, unemotional, indifferent) and dissonant responses (e.g., sadism, scorn, schadenfreude). Of course, whether resonant and dissonant responses are both types of affective empathy is an empirical question. In what follows, we report on the development of a new measure of empathy, which we call the Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy (ACME). Like other measures, the ACME includes separate cognitive and affective scales. Unlike other measures, the ACME includes two scales of affective empathy—affective resonance and affective dissonance. We also establish the structural and predictive validity of the new measure using multiple measures of aggression, externalizing psychopathology, and other measures typically associated with empathy, such as prosocial behavior, high-functioning autism, affective responding, and emotion detection.
Conceptual Framework of the ACME The three ACME scales were constructed using specific conceptualizations of cognitive empathy and affective empathy, the latter of which was split into affective resonance and affective dissonance. Cognitive Empathy was conceptualized as empathic accuracy (Ickes, 1993), which refers to knowing what others are feeling—a broad view of cognitive empathy that includes the ability to detect and understand emotional displays. Affective Resonance was conceptualized broadly as empathic concern, sympathy, pity, and compassion; this conceptualization is aligned with most traditional measures of affective empathy and involves an emotional response in the observer that is congruent in valence to the target (Batson, 2009). Affective Dissonance was conceptualized as the experience of a contradictory emotional response—for example, taking pleasure in others’ pain or feeling annoyed with others’ happiness. Taken together, resonance and dissonance items cover a broader range of affective empathy than previously measured.
Goals of the Current Investigation Three studies were conducted to develop the ACME and establish its structural and external validity. Study 1 is an initial scale development and validation study; the goals were to develop each of the three ACME scales and validate its new Affective Dissonance scale using measures of aggression and externalizing psychopathology. Study 2 is a large-scale survey; the goals were to confirm the internal structure of the ACME, test for measurement invariance across sex, and develop college norms. Study 3 is a laboratory-based study; the goals were to further examine the construct validity of the ACME and rule out third-variable explanations for observed correlations, including general intelligence, emotional reactivity, and socially desirable responding.
Study 1: Development and Initial Validation Method Participants and Procedure. Participants were 369 students (56% male) recruited from an introductory psychology class at a large Midwestern university in the United States. All participants gave written informed consent, completed a battery of self-report questionnaires in moderately sized groups, and received course credit for their participation. They spent 1 hour completing the developmental form of the ACME as well as several self-report measures of empathy, aggression, and externalizing psychopathology. Participants completed 100% of the items and measures—there were no missing data. Institutional review board requirements were followed throughout testing.
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
3
Vachon and Lynam Measures. Participants completed the developmental form of the ACME as well as two other measures of empathy: the IRI and BES. Aside from the ACME, the IRI and BES are the only questionnaires that measure both affective and cognitive empathy. These measures were included to test the incremental associations between the ACME and relevant outcomes. In addition to empathy measures, participants also completed two measures of aggression and two measures of externalizing psychopathology. Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy (ACME)—Developmental version. The developmental form of the ACME consisted of 126 items answered on a 5-point scale ranging from disagree strongly to agree strongly. Items were written to assess a person’s ability to recognize and understand the feelings of others, vicariously experience their emotions, and use this affective information to guide their own behavior. Items were positively and negatively worded, covered a wide range of emotions, and used generic referents (people, others, etc.). A readability analysis of the final items indicated that they were comprehensible: the grade-level of the items was 5.2 for the Flesch–Kincaid index (Flesch, 1948) and 4.6 for the SMOG index (McLaughlin, 1969). Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI). The IRI (Davis, 1983) is a 28-item self-report that measures cognitive empathy (Perspective-Taking scale) and affective empathy (Empathic Concern scale) as well as two constructs unrelated to most conceptualizations of empathy (Fantasy and Personal Distress Scales). The current study used only the cognitive and affective scales, which had coefficient alphas of .71 and .79, respectively. Basic Empathy Scale (BES). The BES (Jolliffe & Farrington, 2006) is a 20-item self-report with scales that measure cognitive and affective empathy. In this study, coefficient alphas for the cognitive and affective scales were .81 and .86, respectively. Aggression Questionnaire (AQ). The AQ (Buss & Perry, 1992) is a 29-item self-report with scales that measure physical aggression, verbal aggression, anger, and hostility. In this study, only the 14 items specific to aggression were included. Coefficient alphas for the physical and verbal aggression scales were .82 and .75, respectively. Reactive-Proactive Aggression Questionnaire (RPQ). The RPQ (Raine et al., 2006) is a 23-item self-report with scales that measure reactive and proactive forms of aggression. In this study, coefficient alphas for the reactive and proactive scales were .80 and .81, respectively. Self-Report Psychopathy Scale: Version III (SRP-III). The SRP-III (Paulhus, Neumann, & Hare, in press) is a 64-item
self-report measure that provides a total psychopathy score as well as score for four subscales: Interpersonal Manipulation, Callous Affect, Erratic Lifestyle, and Antisocial Behavior.1 Alphas for total, Interpersonal Manipulation, Callous Affect, Erratic Lifestyle, and Antisocial Behavior scale scores were .92, .84, .80, .79, and .75, respectively. Dirty Dozen (DD). The Dirty Dozen (Jonason & Webster, 2010) is a 12-item measure of the “Dark Triad,” which includes narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism. In this study, the narcissism and psychopathy scales were used; these had alphas of .78 and .77.
Results and Discussion Development of the ACME Scales. Starting with 126 items, the ACME scales were developed and items culled as follows. First, items with low average interitem correlations (less than .20) were deleted. Next, an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted in Mplus, Version 7 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998-2012), to determine the optimal number of correlated factors. Because ACME items are on a 5-point Likert-type scale, they were treated as polytomous and analyzed using a weighted least squares means and variance adjusted (WLSMV) estimator. However, the chi-square values of different models cannot be compared using the WLSMV estimator, and parallel analysis is not available in Mplus for categorical variables, so the EFA was conducted in the framework of an exploratory structural equation model (ESEM). In an ESEM, the model can be constrained to run just like a typical EFA, and the chi-square values from nested models with different numbers of factors can be compared using the difftest command in Mplus. This process was conducted comparing the one- and two-factor models, the two- and three-factor models, and so forth. Although this procedure continued to indicate a significant change for each added factor, three factors appeared optimal as the difference in fit was small after three factors (change of 2.89, all ps < .01). To investigate whether relations to external variables differed across sex, 66 hierarchical regression analyses were conducted for the 3 ACME scales and 22 external correlates presented in Tables 3 and 6 (from Studies 1 and 3). For each analysis, a single external criterion was regressed onto empathy and sex at Step 1, and a product term carrying the interaction between these two variables at Step 2. Given the large number of analyses, coefficients for product terms were considered significant (F change at Step 2) using a modestly corrected alpha level of p < .01. Across the 66 analyses, none of the product terms were statistically significant, indicating that the relations between the ACME and measures of aggression and externalizing disorders generalize across sex.
Study 2: Factor Structure, Measurement Invariance, and Norms Method Participants, Procedure, and Measures. Participants were 708 students from an introductory psychology class at a Midwestern University in the United States. Of these, 52% were male, 79% were native English speakers, and 70% identified themselves as White. All participants completed the final 36-item ACME during a single, 1-hour session as part of an online mass testing procedure. Participants completed all of the items—there were no missing data. Institutional review board requirements were followed throughout testing.
Results and Discussion Factor Structure. In the current study, the ACME’s threefactor structure was evaluated using CFA in Mplus, version 7 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998-2012). Prior to conducting the CFAs, the items of the ACME dissonance factor were reversed so that high scores on all three ACME scales indicated higher empathy. Because ACME items are on a 5-point Likert-type scale, they were treated as polytomous indicators and were analyzed using a WLSMV estimator. Two method factors, positive and negative wording, were also modeled using a bifactor approach. These method factors appeared in the ESEM analyses conducted in Study 1, subsequent to the first three substantive factors. The large, independent sample in Study 2 provided the opportunity to appropriately model these method factors. The final model, presented in Figure 1, had good fit (CFI = .970, TLI = .972, RMSEA = .038).2 The model had standardized factor loadings for the three ACME factors ranging from .45 to .88 (see Table 4). The two affective empathy factors were very strongly correlated (r = .80), while Cognitive Empathy was moderately associated with
Affective Resonance (r = .44) and weakly associated with Affective Dissonance (r = .25). These findings confirm the hypothesis that resonance and dissonance are both types of affective empathy. In fact, when a second-order affective factor is modeled above resonance and dissonance, the standardized loadings are .94 and .86, respectively. However, this second-order model has slightly worse fit and is less parsimonious than the three-factor model presented in Figure 1. Measurement Invariance Across Sex. To determine whether the three-factor structure was equivalent across men and women, a series of measurement invariance analyses were conducted. These analyses were also conducted in Mplus and followed Millsap and Yun-Tein’s (2004) guidelines for assessing factorial invariance in ordered-categorical measures. Because the chi-square values of different models cannot be compared using the WLSMV estimator, the difftest feature in Mplus was used to compare configural, weak, strong, and strict invariance models. The results of this analysis, also summarized in Figure 1, indicate strict measurement invariance as the best fitting model. More constrained models had better fit statistics and the χ2 difftest values were significant at each step. Another method of testing measurement invariance is the Change in CFI criterion, where a value of ΔCFI < .01 indicates that the null hypothesis of invariance should not be rejected (Cheung & Rensvold, 2002). In the current study, more constrained models had slightly higher CFI than less constrained models; the ΔCFI at each step was .003 to .004, and the CFI for the most constrained model (strict invariance) was .011 higher than the least constrained model (configural invariance). The ΔCFI values were generally less than the .01 criterion. When the fit is equivalent, the more parsimonious model is preferred. Thus, no difference means the more restricted model (strict invariance) is preferred. These findings suggest that the structure of the ACME, including its loadings, intercepts, and residuals, remains invariant across sex. Norms. College norms for the ACME are provided in Table 5, including means and standard deviations for each ACME scale. Data are provided at the aggregate level as well as for groups divided by sex and race. Given the small number of participants in each racial category, norms were only provided for White and non-White groups.
Study 3: Laboratory Investigation Method Participants and Procedure. Participants were 210 students (43% male) from an introductory psychology class at a large Midwestern university in the United States. Of these participants, 44 (21%) identified English as their second language. Participants were tested individually in a
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
8
Assessment
.25/.24 Cognive Empathy
.45/.43
Affecve Resonance
.78/.82
7 8 12 13 17 22 23 24 28 29 30 32
1 3 4 9 14 15 16 25 31 33 34 35
Posively Scored
Affecve Dissonance
2 5 6 10 11 18 19 20 21 26 27 36
Negavely Scored
Measurement invariance Configural Chi-2 diest (WLSMV) Value Degrees of freedom P-value RMSEA CFI TLI
Weak
Strong
109.38 159.96 67 106 < 0.001 < 0.001 0.049 0.046 0.041 0.959 0.962 0.966 0.954 0.959 0.966
Strict 67.34 36 0.001 0.038 0.970 0.972
Figure 1. Correlated factor structure of the ACME, Strict invariance across sex (females/males).
laboratory setting over a period of 2 hours. Participants completed 100% of the items and measures—there were no missing data. Institutional review board requirements were followed throughout testing.
the IRI scales, and .73 to .82 for the BES scales. Full item and scale characteristics are provided in Table 2.
Measures. Participants completed the ACME and other self-report measures of empathy, prosocial behavior, affect, and psychopathology. They also had their intelligence assessed by an interviewer and completed laboratory tasks that measured their empathic response to pictures and ability to detect emotional expressions.
Self-Report Altruism Scale (SRAS). Altruistic behavior was assessed using the 20-item SRAS (Rushton, Chrisjohn, & Fekken, 1981). Participants rated the frequency with which they have engaged in several altruistic behaviors, from “never” to “very often.” The SRAS exhibits high internal consistency, discriminant and convergent validity, and little relation to social desirability (r = .05; Rushton et al., 1981). In this study, coefficient alpha for the SRAS was .85.
Empathy. Participants completed the ACME, IRI, and BES, which are described in Study 1. Coefficient alphas ranged from .85 to .90 for the ACME scales, .65 to .75 for
Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS). Positive Affect and Negative Affect were assessed with the widely used 20-item PANAS (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988).
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
9
Vachon and Lynam Table 4. Study 2 (N = 703) Standardized Factor Loadings for the Final Three-Factor Model. ACME factor loadings ACME1r ACME3 ACME4 ACME9 ACME14r ACME15 ACME16 ACME25 ACME31r ACME33 ACME34 ACME35r ACME7 ACME8 ACME12r ACME13r ACME17r ACME22r ACME23 ACME24r ACME28 ACME29 ACME30 ACME32r ACME2r ACME5r ACME6r ACME10r ACME11r ACME18r ACME19r ACME20r ACME21r ACME26r ACME27r ACME36r
COG
Method factor loadings
RES
DIS
POS
NEG
Female
Male
Female
Male
Female
Male
Female
Male
Female
Male
0.801 0.586 0.591 0.632 0.768 0.573 0.660 0.808 0.689 0.671 0.863 0.799 — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
0.824 0.602 0.612 0.661 0.797 0.584 0.668 0.833 0.726 0.702 0.882 0.828 — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
— — — — — — — — — — — — 0.861 0.640 0.734 0.636 0.683 0.649 0.593 0.549 0.586 0.606 0.845 0.570 — — — — — — — — — — — —
— — — — — — — — — — — — 0.858 0.619 0.702 0.643 0.684 0.660 0.601 0.542 0.592 0.598 0.842 0.570 — — — — — — — — — — — —
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 0.512 0.560 0.552 0.721 0.727 0.490 0.567 0.550 0.693 0.455 0.402 0.488
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 0.515 0.559 0.544 0.700 0.706 0.515 0.576 0.551 0.687 0.453 0.494 0.488
— 0.444 0.415 0.257 — 0.517 0.494 0.098 — 0.189 0.069 — 0.375 0.454 — — — — 0.138 — 0.154 0.012 0.031 — — — — — — — — — — — — —
— 0.487 0.440 0.286 — 0.560 0.532 0.107 — 0.211 0.065 — 0.431 0.517 — — — — 0.162 — 0.181 0.014 0.037 — — — — — — — — — — — — —
0.205 — — — 0.042 — — — 0.153 — — 0.130 — — 0.362 0.260 0.414 0.393 — 0.379 — — — 0.265 0.479 0.533 0.455 0.133 0.066 0.511 0.627 0.592 0.409 0.577 0.481 0.577
0.200 — — — 0.055 — — — 0.125 — — 0.104 — — 0.316 0.226 0.364 0.344 — 0.332 — — — 0.230 0.429 0.483 0.408 0.117 0.059 0.460 0.579 0.539 0.368 0.521 0.428 0.525
Note. Unstandardized factor loadings are equal for men and women, but standardized factor loadings are presented for ease of interpretation. See Figure 1 for the full structural model. ACME = Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy; COG = Cognitive Empathy Scale; RES = Affective Resonance Scale; DIS = Affective Dissonance Scale; r = reverse-scored item
Coefficient alpha for the positive and negative factors were .84 and .83, respectively. Affective Lability Scale–Short Form (ALS-SF). Affective lability, the propensity for rapid shifts in emotion, was measured using an abbreviated measure of emotion dysregulation, the 18-item ALS-SF (Oliver & Simons, 2004). Coefficient alpha for the ALS-SF total score was .86. The
ALS-SF also has three subscales that represent the propensity to swing from anxiety to depression, from elation to depression, and from calmness to anger; alphas for these scales were .83, .78, and .75. Affective responding task. The affective empathy picture task used pictures from the International Affective Picture System (Lang, Bradley, & Cuthbert, 2005), a set of
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
10
Assessment
Table 5. College Norms for the Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy.
Total (n = 708) Male (n = 418) Female (n = 385) White (n = 562) Non-White (n = 226)a
Cognitive Empathy
Affective Resonance
Affective Dissonance
M
SD
M
SD
M
SD
51.80 50.89 52.79 52.58 50.32
9.32 9.61 8.91 9.46 8.81
56.83 54.15 59.75 58.50 53.62
9.07 8.98 8.24 8.41 9.16
56.24 52.79 59.98 57.67 54.07
10.04 9.78 9.78 9.44 9.56
Note. All Affective Dissonance items have been reverse scored so that higher scores on all three scales indicate greater empathy. Items are scored on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from Strongly disagree (1) to Strongly agree (5). Values represent sum of items, scored from 1 = Disagree strongly to 5 = Agree strongly. a. The 226 non-White participants include 60% Asian, 13% Black, 10% Hispanic, and 18% other.
evocative color photographs that have been widely used to study subjective, physiological, and behavioral responses to affective stimuli. In the current study, 20 pictures were selected that depict people expressing an emotion during positive events (10 pictures) or negative events (10 pictures). While viewing each picture, participants rated their emotional response on two, 7-point scales from very negative to very positive (pleasure dimension) and from very bored/ unstimulated to very awake/stimulated (arousal dimension). Physiological measures of pleasure and arousal are highly correlated with these self-report ratings. For example, facial electromyography activity covaries strongly with self-report pleasantness ratings (r = .90), and both skin conductance (r = .81) and the magnitude of late positive component in the event-related potential (r = .81) covary strongly with self-report arousal ratings (Cuthbert, Schupp, Bradley, Birbaumer, & Lang, 2000). Alphas for pleasure ratings were .80 and .74 for positive and negative pictures, respectively; alphas for arousal ratings were .78 and .89. Broad Autism Phenotype Questionnaire (BAPQ). A high-functioning autism phenotype was assessed using the 36-item BAPQ (Hurley, Losh, Parlier, Reznick, & Piven, 2007), which yields a total score and three subscale scores: Aloof Personality, Pragmatic Language, and Rigid Routine. Evidence suggests that the BAPQ has good internal consistency, stable factor structure, and high criterion validity in non-clinical samples (Ingersoll, Hopwood, Wainer, & Donnellan, 2011). Coefficient alpha for the total, Aloof Personality, Pragmatic Language, and Rigid Routine scales were .88, .87, .67, and .83, respectively. Self-Report Psychopathy Scale: Version III (SRP-III). A description of the SRP-III is provided in Study 1. Coefficient alphas for total, Interpersonal Manipulation, Callous Affect, Erratic Lifestyle, and Antisocial Behavior scales were .91, .81, .74, .83, and .62, respectively.
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale–Fourth Edition (WAISIV). Verbal and nonverbal intelligence were assessed using the Vocabulary and Block Design subtests of the WAIS-IV (Wechsler, 2008). The Vocabulary and Block Design subtests yield scores that are highly correlated with full-scale estimates of verbal (r = .78) and nonverbal (r = .73) intelligence. Testing was administered by two undergraduate interviewers, who were trained and supervised by an advanced graduate student and a professor. Scoring for the Block Design subtest was completed by the interviewers, and scoring for the Vocabulary subtest was conducted by the advanced graduate student. Emotional Expression Multimorph Task (Morph Task). The ability to detect facial expressions was assessed using a variant of the Morph Task (Blair, Colledge, Murray, & Mitchell, 2001). Prototypical emotional expressions taken from the valid and reliable pictures of facial affect (Ekman & Friesen, 1976) were blended together with pictures of neutral facial expressions to form a continuum of morphed images ranging from completely neutral (0% intensity) to full expression (100% intensity). For each of six basic expressions (happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, and surprise), participants sequentially viewed facial expressions at 20%, 30%, 40%, 50%, 60%, 70%, and 80% expression. At each viewing, the facial expression was displayed for 1 second before participants were asked to select an emotional expression from the six options listed on the screen. The outcome variable was the number of correct responses. An item was dropped from analysis if the accuracy for that item was lower than chance (16.6%) or so high that almost everyone got it right (>90%). This resulted in 6 to 12 item scales for each emotion. Coefficient alpha for total, happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, and surprise accuracy scales were .80, .62, .84, .87, .76, .74, and .74, respectively. Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Behavior, Postures subtest (DANVA2-POS). The DANVA2-POS (Pitterman & Nowicki, 2004) task consists of 24 full-body pictures of
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
11
Vachon and Lynam Table 6. Study 3 (N = 210) Pearson Correlations Between Empathy and Prosocial Behavior, Autism, Affective Responding, and Emotion Detection. Affective Empathy Prosocial Behavior SRA Altruistic Behavior Autism BAPQ Autism Phenotype Total Aloof Personality Pragmatic Language Rigid Routine Affective Responding Pleasure for Positive Pictures Pleasure for Negative Pictures Arousal for Positive Pictures Arousal for Negative Pictures Emotion Detection Facial Multimorph Task DANVA Postures Task
Cognitive Empathy IRI
BES
ACME
ACME DIS
ACME
IRI
BES
RES
.12
.24
.37
.11
.05
.18
−.19 −.09 −.12 −.21
−.17 −.09 −.16 −.13
−.35 −.29 −.31 −.21
−.19 −.22 −.12 −.08
−.07 −.12 .00 −.02
−.34 −.39 −.22 −.15
.16 .00 .21 .03
.15 .00 .18 .18
.19 −.08 .12 .14
.14 −.14 .21 .18
.19 −.14 .22 .20
.22 −.30 .27 .23
.05 −.12
.11 .17
.13 .17
.24 .11
.23 .02
.26 .27
.18 −.41 −.39 −.29 −.25 .14 −.15 .16 −.06 .19 .19
Note. All Affective Dissonance items have been reverse scored so that higher scores on all three scales indicate greater empathy. IRI = Interpersonal Reactivity Index; BES = Basic Empathy Scales; ACME = Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy; RES = Affective Resonance Scale; DIS = Affective Dissonance Scale (reversed); SRA = Self-Report Altruism Scale; BAPQ = Brief Autism Phenotype Questionnaire; IAPS = International Affective Picture System; DANVA = Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Behavior. p < .01 for bolded correlations.
models whose posture portrays happiness, sadness, anger, or fear. Models are dressed in black and their faces are obscured with a black oval so that judgments are made on the basis of posture alone. In this study, coefficient alpha for the DANVA2-POS was only .45; accordingly, items with item-total correlations below .20 were dropped, resulting in a 17-item measure with an alpha of .62. Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR). The BIDR is a 40-item measure of self-deceptive positivity and impression management (Paulhus, 1988). The BIDR exhibits good internal consistency, test–retest reliability, and concurrent validity with other measures of socially desirable responding. In this study, coefficient alpha for the total, Self-Deceptive Positivity, and Impression Management were .77, .67, and .72, respectively.
Results and Discussion Consistency of Empathy Measurement Across Samples. In the current study, relations among the scales of the ACME, IRI, and BES were nearly identical to those in Study 1 (intraclass correlation = .97). Empathy measures also bore comparable relations to the total and subscale scores of the SRP in Study 1 (intraclass correlation = .96). Furthermore, across all three studies, means for each empathy scale were equivalent (ps > .05), and the average change in alpha reliability
for the scales between studies was small (.04). This suggests that sampling and method differences between studies did not alter the way empathy measures worked. Associations between empathy and external variables. Table 6 presents zero-order correlations between each empathy scale and several constructs relevant to empathy that were not included in Study 1, such as prosocial behavior, autism phenotype, empathic responding, and empathic accuracy. Unlike Study 1, where dissonance was expected to provide an incremental contribution to the prediction of aggression and externalizing psychopathology, Study 3 correlations for the whole ACME measure are expected to be similar to correlations observed for other empathy measures. It is important that increasing the relation between empathy and aggression/externalizing does not come at the cost of reducing its relations to other important elements of the nomological net surrounding empathy. Across all measures, the ACME performed well. Correlations between the ACME cognitive scale and various outcomes—including altruism, autism phenotype (reversed), affective responding, and emotion detection—were at least as large as correlations for other cognitive measures. This was the case for zero-order correlations (average rs for ACME, BES, and IRI were .24, .15, and .09, respectively) as well as semipartial correlations (average srs for ACME, BES, and IRI were .16, .02, and .01, respectively). Correlations for
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
12
Assessment
Table 7. Study 3 (N = 210) Ruling Out Alternative Explanations for Empathy Relations. Affective Empathy
Cognitive Empathy
Alternative 1: Cognitive Empathy is just intelligence WAIS Verbal IQ (Vocabulary) WAIS Nonverbal IQ (Block Design) Alternative 2: Affective Empathy is just emotionality PANAS Positive Affect PANAS Negative Affect ALS-SF Affective Lability Anxiety/Depression Elation/Depression Anger Alternative 3: Self-reported empathy is just desirable responding BIDR Desirable Responding
IRI
BES
ACME
IRI
BES
ACME
ACME
RES
DIS
r r
.03 .07
.16 .12
.13 .11
— —
— —
— —
— —
r r r r r r
— — — — — —
— — — — — —
— — — — — —
.03 −.13 .03 .05 .04 −.03
−.05 .02 .08 .06 .09 .03
.07 −.14 −.19 −.08 −.14 −.26
.25 −.27 −.39 −.20 −.34 −.40
r
.29
.29
.05
.20
−.17
.07
.11
Note. All Affective Dissonance items have been reverse scored so that higher scores on all three scales indicate greater empathy. EFL = English as a first language; WAIS = Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale; IQ = intelligence quotient; PANAS = Positive and Negative Affect Schedule; ALS-SF = Affective Lability Scale–Short Form; BIDR = Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding. p < .01 for bolded correlations.
the ACME affective scales were also at least as large as other measures at both the zero-order level (average rs for ACME resonance, ACME dissonance, BES, and IRI were .24, .19, .12, and .09, respectively) and at the semipartial level (average srs were .14, .09, .02, and .01, respectively). Ruling Out Potential Confounds. An additional goal of this study was to determine whether associations between empathy and external variables were spurious—whether associations with cognitive empathy are explained by intelligence, whether associations with affective empathy are explained by emotionality, and/or whether associations with any type of self-reported empathy are explained by social desirability. Table 7 presents evidence against these alternative explanations, at least for the scales of the ACME. First, the cognitive scale of the ACME was not significantly associated with verbal or nonverbal intelligence.3 Second, the affective scales of the ACME were significantly correlated with emotional stability rather than lability. Finally, none of the three ACME scales was associated with desirable responding. Incremental Contribution of the ACME. The incremental contributions of the ACME, IRI, and BES as whole measures were estimated using a simultaneous analysis of sets. To calculate the unique contribution of the ACME, for example, the IRI and BES scales were entered in Step 1 and the ACME scales in Step 2; the change in R2 at Step 2 represents the incremental contribution of the ACME to the prediction of the dependent variable. Figure 2 presents the
results of these analyses: the ACME provided the largest increment in prediction across all outcomes, including various types of aggression, externalizing psychopathology, prosocial behavior, empathic responding, and emotion detection. Across these variables, the average unique contribution of the ACME (13%) was considerably larger than the contributions of the IRI (1%) and BES (1%).
General Discussion This investigation used 3 studies and 1,287 participants to establish the structural and external validity of the ACME. With regard to structural validity, exploratory analyses yielded three factors—one cognitive empathy factor and two affective empathy factors (resonance and dissonance). Across all three studies, these factors had similar means, internal consistencies, intercorrelations, and relations to important criteria. The three-factor structure of the ACME developed in Study 1 also demonstrated good fit in the large, independent sample used in Study 2. A very strong correlation between the affective resonance and dissonance factors suggest that they represent affective empathy subscales, and the superior fit of a strict invariance model indicating structural generalizability across sex, despite marked mean differences in levels of empathy. In terms of external validity, the ACME also fared well. The affective scales of the ACME—particularly the new dissonance scale—exhibited moderate to strong negative associations with various forms of aggressive behavior and
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
13
Vachon and Lynam
Figure 2. Incremental prediction of important outcomes: ΔR2 for the ACME, IRI, and BES when entered in the last step of a hierarchical regression.
externalizing behavior, supporting the hypothesis that limitations associated with other empathy measures may have reduced the meta-analytic empathy–aggression effect size reported by Vachon et al. (2014). Across all measures, the overall incremental contribution of the ACME (14%) was sizable compared with that of the IRI (1%) or BES (1%). These findings justify the need for a new measure of empathy and for a new affective empathy scale. Three possible confounds were also ruled out: intelligence, emotionality, and social desirability. First, some have suggested that cognitive empathy is an aspect of intelligence and that empathy training for offenders may be constrained by low intellectual ability (Jolliffe & Farrington, 2004). In the current study, ACME cognitive empathy was unrelated to intelligence. Second, low empathy is often paired with unemotionality in the child literature (e.g., callous-unemotional traits; Frick & White, 2008), so it is possible that high empathy is an expression of emotionality. In the current study, however, high affective empathy was associated with emotional stability rather than emotionality. Third, because empathy is a desirable characteristic, correlations between high empathy scores and undesirable characteristics (e.g., aggression, psychopathology, etc.) may be
explained by the effects of social desirability. In the current study, however, scores on all three ACME scores were unrelated to social desirability. There are some limitations to the current study. The most important limitation is that all three studies were conducted in college samples at a Midwestern university. Further validation efforts need to test the ACME in samples with a wider age range and more racial and ethnic diversity. It is also important to show that the ACME maintains its structure and nomological net in clinical populations and when it is translated into different languages. Another possible limitation is that a fairly large percentage of the sample in Study 3 had English as a second language, and that this may have affected the results of the study. However, there are several reasons why this may not be a concern: For both native and nonnative English speakers, mean scores on the ACME and other measures were not significantly different, differences in internal consistency estimates were small (average difference in α = .02), and relations among the various empathy scales were nearly identical (intraclass correlation = .98). Finally, a possible limitation of all self-report measures of cognitive empathy is that they ask individuals to rate their ability at detecting and understanding emotions rather than
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
14
Assessment
directly testing this ability. This may be a problem both because of desirability effects and because self-reports are inappropriate for assessing cognitive abilities. In the current study, the ACME was not related to social desirability; however, the method question remains—are self-report and ability-based measures of cognitive empathy comparable? Preliminary research on emotional intelligence suggests that they may not be (Goldernberg, Matheson, & Mantler, 2006), but this remains a question for the field. Overall, the ACME is a promising new instrument for assessing various aspects of empathy. It is internally consistent and structurally invariant across samples and sexes. It is also resistant to the effects of social desirability and predicts important outcomes, including aggression and externalizing disorders; these predictions are generalizable across sex and incremental to other measures of empathy. Importantly, the ACME reconceptualizes empathy in a way that incorporates pathological manifestations of empathy (e.g., psychopathic callousness) and synchronizes it with contemporary thinking regarding its importance to violence. Given that empathy is a main character in theories of aggression, a core criterion for various externalizing disorders, and a primary area of focus in forensic treatment, it is imperative that the measurement of empathy catches up to its application. Declaration of Conflicting Interests The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Notes 1. Four items from the Antisocial Behavior subscale were dropped because of very low endorsement rates in college samples: Item 12, “I have assaulted a law enforcement officer,” Item 62, “I have close friends who served time in prison,” Item 63, “I purposely tried to hit someone with a vehicle I was driving,” and Item 64, “I have violated my probation from prison.” 2. Although it is difficult to specify precise cutoff points for fit indices, the following general rules of thumb were adopted in the present study (Byrne, 2012; Hu & Bentler, 1999): CFI/ TLI >.95 (good), .90 to .95 (borderline), and
research-article2015
ASMXXX10.1177/1073191114567941AssessmentVachon and Lynam
Article
Fixing the Problem With Empathy: Development and Validation of the Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy
Assessment 1–15 © The Author(s) 2015 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/1073191114567941 asm.sagepub.com
David D. Vachon1, and Donald R. Lynam2
Abstract Low empathy is a criterion for most externalizing disorders, and empathy training is a regular component of treatment for aggressive people, from school bullies to sex offenders. However, recent meta-analytic evidence suggests that current measures of empathy explain only 1% of the variance in aggressive behavior. A new assessment of empathy was developed to more fully represent the empathy construct and better predict important outcomes—particularly aggressive behavior and externalizing psychopathology. Across three independent samples (N = 210-708), the 36-item Affective and Cognitive measure of Empathy (ACME) was internally consistent, structurally reliable, and invariant across sex. The ACME bore significant associations to important outcomes, which were incremental relative to other measures of empathy and generalizable across sex. Importantly, the affective scales of the ACME—particularly a new “Affective Dissonance” scale— yielded moderate to strong associations with aggressive behavior and externalizing disorders. The ACME is a short, reliable, and useful measure of empathy. Keywords aggression, prosocial, externalizing, self-report, resonance, dissonance, antisocial The definition and conceptualization of empathy has varied considerably over the last 50 years (Batson, 2009; Wispé, 1987). Despite these definitional disagreements, however, assumptions regarding the importance of empathy are pervasive. A basic assumption regarding empathy is that it both facilitates prosocial behavior (Eisenberg & Miller, 1987) and inhibits antisocial behavior (Jolliffe & Farrington, 2004; Miller & Eisenberg, 1988). Individuals with high empathy understand how others feel, “cognitive empathy,” and vicariously experience their emotions, “affective empathy.” Thus, empathy is an investigative tool, allowing individuals to glean affective information through cognitive processes and emotional simulations. It is assumed that people with high empathy use this information to alleviate the suffering of others and avoid engaging in potentially harmful behavior, whereas people with low empathy cannot use such information to guide their behavior. As a result, perpetrators of antisocial behavior, violence, and rape are regularly described as having insufficient empathy (Miller & Eisenberg, 1988). Empathy also plays an important role in several externalizing syndromes included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th ed.; DSM-5; American Psychiatric Association, 2013), including conduct disorder, antisocial
personality disorder, and narcissistic personality disorder. The new trait model in Section III of DSM-5 further elevates the prominence of empathy; in Section III, empathy deficits are assumed to be core to all personality disorders. Empathy deficits also play a major role in psychopathy, a personality disorder characterized by chronic aggression and other forms of antisocial behavior (Cleckley, 1941/1988; Hare & Neumann, 2008). Empathy-externalizing research continues to flourish and clinical applications are widespread. For example, programs designed to increase empathy in offenders are a standard component of treatment in correctional settings, particularly in the treatment of sexual offenders (Marshall, 1999). More than $500 million each year is spent on therapy for sex offenders that has “victim awareness and empathy” training as its most frequent component (93% of men’s programs and 95% of women’s programs; McGrath, Cumming, 1
University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA
2
Corresponding Author: David D. Vachon, 701 N 2nd St., Suite 209, Minneapolis, MN 55401, USA. Email: [email protected]
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
2
Assessment
Burchard, Zeoli, & Ellerby, 2010). Empathy training is also a core feature of therapy programs outside correctional settings, including violence prevention curricula for elementary school students (Grossman et al., 1997), anger management therapy for youth (Pecukonis, 1990), and treatment for perpetrators of domestic violence (Fruzzetti & Levensky, 2000). But there is a problem with empathy. Despite assumptions regarding its importance to aggressive behavior, a recent meta-analysis by Vachon, Lynam, and Johnson (2014) suggests that empathy and aggression are virtually unrelated. Across all measures of empathy and aggression, empathy explained only 1% of the variance in aggression (average r = −.11). Prediction was also low across specific forms of aggression, including verbal aggression (4%), physical aggression (1%), and sexual aggression (1%). Vachon et al. offered two potential explanations for this small association: (a) the true association is weak, and expectations regarding the importance of empathy in aggressive behavior are unrealistic; (b) the true association between empathy and aggression is stronger but diminished by measurement problems. Vachon et al. advocated a variant of the second position, arguing that current conceptions of affective empathy are too narrow and fail to capture the full range of the construct. Specifically, traditional theories of affective empathy focus on how an individual’s feelings resonate with those of others. Scales range from a high level of resonance (empathy) to a low level of resonance (indifference). However, clinical descriptions of pathologically low empathy also include dissonant emotions, such as enjoyment of others’ misery and scorn for their emotional experiences. Construing affective empathy as a broader construct that includes such dissonant emotions could accommodate basic and clinical conceptualizations of empathy. Specifically, empathy can be extended beyond resonant responses (e.g., empathy, sympathy, compassion) to include a lack of response (e.g., callous, unemotional, indifferent) and dissonant responses (e.g., sadism, scorn, schadenfreude). Of course, whether resonant and dissonant responses are both types of affective empathy is an empirical question. In what follows, we report on the development of a new measure of empathy, which we call the Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy (ACME). Like other measures, the ACME includes separate cognitive and affective scales. Unlike other measures, the ACME includes two scales of affective empathy—affective resonance and affective dissonance. We also establish the structural and predictive validity of the new measure using multiple measures of aggression, externalizing psychopathology, and other measures typically associated with empathy, such as prosocial behavior, high-functioning autism, affective responding, and emotion detection.
Conceptual Framework of the ACME The three ACME scales were constructed using specific conceptualizations of cognitive empathy and affective empathy, the latter of which was split into affective resonance and affective dissonance. Cognitive Empathy was conceptualized as empathic accuracy (Ickes, 1993), which refers to knowing what others are feeling—a broad view of cognitive empathy that includes the ability to detect and understand emotional displays. Affective Resonance was conceptualized broadly as empathic concern, sympathy, pity, and compassion; this conceptualization is aligned with most traditional measures of affective empathy and involves an emotional response in the observer that is congruent in valence to the target (Batson, 2009). Affective Dissonance was conceptualized as the experience of a contradictory emotional response—for example, taking pleasure in others’ pain or feeling annoyed with others’ happiness. Taken together, resonance and dissonance items cover a broader range of affective empathy than previously measured.
Goals of the Current Investigation Three studies were conducted to develop the ACME and establish its structural and external validity. Study 1 is an initial scale development and validation study; the goals were to develop each of the three ACME scales and validate its new Affective Dissonance scale using measures of aggression and externalizing psychopathology. Study 2 is a large-scale survey; the goals were to confirm the internal structure of the ACME, test for measurement invariance across sex, and develop college norms. Study 3 is a laboratory-based study; the goals were to further examine the construct validity of the ACME and rule out third-variable explanations for observed correlations, including general intelligence, emotional reactivity, and socially desirable responding.
Study 1: Development and Initial Validation Method Participants and Procedure. Participants were 369 students (56% male) recruited from an introductory psychology class at a large Midwestern university in the United States. All participants gave written informed consent, completed a battery of self-report questionnaires in moderately sized groups, and received course credit for their participation. They spent 1 hour completing the developmental form of the ACME as well as several self-report measures of empathy, aggression, and externalizing psychopathology. Participants completed 100% of the items and measures—there were no missing data. Institutional review board requirements were followed throughout testing.
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
3
Vachon and Lynam Measures. Participants completed the developmental form of the ACME as well as two other measures of empathy: the IRI and BES. Aside from the ACME, the IRI and BES are the only questionnaires that measure both affective and cognitive empathy. These measures were included to test the incremental associations between the ACME and relevant outcomes. In addition to empathy measures, participants also completed two measures of aggression and two measures of externalizing psychopathology. Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy (ACME)—Developmental version. The developmental form of the ACME consisted of 126 items answered on a 5-point scale ranging from disagree strongly to agree strongly. Items were written to assess a person’s ability to recognize and understand the feelings of others, vicariously experience their emotions, and use this affective information to guide their own behavior. Items were positively and negatively worded, covered a wide range of emotions, and used generic referents (people, others, etc.). A readability analysis of the final items indicated that they were comprehensible: the grade-level of the items was 5.2 for the Flesch–Kincaid index (Flesch, 1948) and 4.6 for the SMOG index (McLaughlin, 1969). Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI). The IRI (Davis, 1983) is a 28-item self-report that measures cognitive empathy (Perspective-Taking scale) and affective empathy (Empathic Concern scale) as well as two constructs unrelated to most conceptualizations of empathy (Fantasy and Personal Distress Scales). The current study used only the cognitive and affective scales, which had coefficient alphas of .71 and .79, respectively. Basic Empathy Scale (BES). The BES (Jolliffe & Farrington, 2006) is a 20-item self-report with scales that measure cognitive and affective empathy. In this study, coefficient alphas for the cognitive and affective scales were .81 and .86, respectively. Aggression Questionnaire (AQ). The AQ (Buss & Perry, 1992) is a 29-item self-report with scales that measure physical aggression, verbal aggression, anger, and hostility. In this study, only the 14 items specific to aggression were included. Coefficient alphas for the physical and verbal aggression scales were .82 and .75, respectively. Reactive-Proactive Aggression Questionnaire (RPQ). The RPQ (Raine et al., 2006) is a 23-item self-report with scales that measure reactive and proactive forms of aggression. In this study, coefficient alphas for the reactive and proactive scales were .80 and .81, respectively. Self-Report Psychopathy Scale: Version III (SRP-III). The SRP-III (Paulhus, Neumann, & Hare, in press) is a 64-item
self-report measure that provides a total psychopathy score as well as score for four subscales: Interpersonal Manipulation, Callous Affect, Erratic Lifestyle, and Antisocial Behavior.1 Alphas for total, Interpersonal Manipulation, Callous Affect, Erratic Lifestyle, and Antisocial Behavior scale scores were .92, .84, .80, .79, and .75, respectively. Dirty Dozen (DD). The Dirty Dozen (Jonason & Webster, 2010) is a 12-item measure of the “Dark Triad,” which includes narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism. In this study, the narcissism and psychopathy scales were used; these had alphas of .78 and .77.
Results and Discussion Development of the ACME Scales. Starting with 126 items, the ACME scales were developed and items culled as follows. First, items with low average interitem correlations (less than .20) were deleted. Next, an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted in Mplus, Version 7 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998-2012), to determine the optimal number of correlated factors. Because ACME items are on a 5-point Likert-type scale, they were treated as polytomous and analyzed using a weighted least squares means and variance adjusted (WLSMV) estimator. However, the chi-square values of different models cannot be compared using the WLSMV estimator, and parallel analysis is not available in Mplus for categorical variables, so the EFA was conducted in the framework of an exploratory structural equation model (ESEM). In an ESEM, the model can be constrained to run just like a typical EFA, and the chi-square values from nested models with different numbers of factors can be compared using the difftest command in Mplus. This process was conducted comparing the one- and two-factor models, the two- and three-factor models, and so forth. Although this procedure continued to indicate a significant change for each added factor, three factors appeared optimal as the difference in fit was small after three factors (change of 2.89, all ps < .01). To investigate whether relations to external variables differed across sex, 66 hierarchical regression analyses were conducted for the 3 ACME scales and 22 external correlates presented in Tables 3 and 6 (from Studies 1 and 3). For each analysis, a single external criterion was regressed onto empathy and sex at Step 1, and a product term carrying the interaction between these two variables at Step 2. Given the large number of analyses, coefficients for product terms were considered significant (F change at Step 2) using a modestly corrected alpha level of p < .01. Across the 66 analyses, none of the product terms were statistically significant, indicating that the relations between the ACME and measures of aggression and externalizing disorders generalize across sex.
Study 2: Factor Structure, Measurement Invariance, and Norms Method Participants, Procedure, and Measures. Participants were 708 students from an introductory psychology class at a Midwestern University in the United States. Of these, 52% were male, 79% were native English speakers, and 70% identified themselves as White. All participants completed the final 36-item ACME during a single, 1-hour session as part of an online mass testing procedure. Participants completed all of the items—there were no missing data. Institutional review board requirements were followed throughout testing.
Results and Discussion Factor Structure. In the current study, the ACME’s threefactor structure was evaluated using CFA in Mplus, version 7 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998-2012). Prior to conducting the CFAs, the items of the ACME dissonance factor were reversed so that high scores on all three ACME scales indicated higher empathy. Because ACME items are on a 5-point Likert-type scale, they were treated as polytomous indicators and were analyzed using a WLSMV estimator. Two method factors, positive and negative wording, were also modeled using a bifactor approach. These method factors appeared in the ESEM analyses conducted in Study 1, subsequent to the first three substantive factors. The large, independent sample in Study 2 provided the opportunity to appropriately model these method factors. The final model, presented in Figure 1, had good fit (CFI = .970, TLI = .972, RMSEA = .038).2 The model had standardized factor loadings for the three ACME factors ranging from .45 to .88 (see Table 4). The two affective empathy factors were very strongly correlated (r = .80), while Cognitive Empathy was moderately associated with
Affective Resonance (r = .44) and weakly associated with Affective Dissonance (r = .25). These findings confirm the hypothesis that resonance and dissonance are both types of affective empathy. In fact, when a second-order affective factor is modeled above resonance and dissonance, the standardized loadings are .94 and .86, respectively. However, this second-order model has slightly worse fit and is less parsimonious than the three-factor model presented in Figure 1. Measurement Invariance Across Sex. To determine whether the three-factor structure was equivalent across men and women, a series of measurement invariance analyses were conducted. These analyses were also conducted in Mplus and followed Millsap and Yun-Tein’s (2004) guidelines for assessing factorial invariance in ordered-categorical measures. Because the chi-square values of different models cannot be compared using the WLSMV estimator, the difftest feature in Mplus was used to compare configural, weak, strong, and strict invariance models. The results of this analysis, also summarized in Figure 1, indicate strict measurement invariance as the best fitting model. More constrained models had better fit statistics and the χ2 difftest values were significant at each step. Another method of testing measurement invariance is the Change in CFI criterion, where a value of ΔCFI < .01 indicates that the null hypothesis of invariance should not be rejected (Cheung & Rensvold, 2002). In the current study, more constrained models had slightly higher CFI than less constrained models; the ΔCFI at each step was .003 to .004, and the CFI for the most constrained model (strict invariance) was .011 higher than the least constrained model (configural invariance). The ΔCFI values were generally less than the .01 criterion. When the fit is equivalent, the more parsimonious model is preferred. Thus, no difference means the more restricted model (strict invariance) is preferred. These findings suggest that the structure of the ACME, including its loadings, intercepts, and residuals, remains invariant across sex. Norms. College norms for the ACME are provided in Table 5, including means and standard deviations for each ACME scale. Data are provided at the aggregate level as well as for groups divided by sex and race. Given the small number of participants in each racial category, norms were only provided for White and non-White groups.
Study 3: Laboratory Investigation Method Participants and Procedure. Participants were 210 students (43% male) from an introductory psychology class at a large Midwestern university in the United States. Of these participants, 44 (21%) identified English as their second language. Participants were tested individually in a
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
8
Assessment
.25/.24 Cognive Empathy
.45/.43
Affecve Resonance
.78/.82
7 8 12 13 17 22 23 24 28 29 30 32
1 3 4 9 14 15 16 25 31 33 34 35
Posively Scored
Affecve Dissonance
2 5 6 10 11 18 19 20 21 26 27 36
Negavely Scored
Measurement invariance Configural Chi-2 diest (WLSMV) Value Degrees of freedom P-value RMSEA CFI TLI
Weak
Strong
109.38 159.96 67 106 < 0.001 < 0.001 0.049 0.046 0.041 0.959 0.962 0.966 0.954 0.959 0.966
Strict 67.34 36 0.001 0.038 0.970 0.972
Figure 1. Correlated factor structure of the ACME, Strict invariance across sex (females/males).
laboratory setting over a period of 2 hours. Participants completed 100% of the items and measures—there were no missing data. Institutional review board requirements were followed throughout testing.
the IRI scales, and .73 to .82 for the BES scales. Full item and scale characteristics are provided in Table 2.
Measures. Participants completed the ACME and other self-report measures of empathy, prosocial behavior, affect, and psychopathology. They also had their intelligence assessed by an interviewer and completed laboratory tasks that measured their empathic response to pictures and ability to detect emotional expressions.
Self-Report Altruism Scale (SRAS). Altruistic behavior was assessed using the 20-item SRAS (Rushton, Chrisjohn, & Fekken, 1981). Participants rated the frequency with which they have engaged in several altruistic behaviors, from “never” to “very often.” The SRAS exhibits high internal consistency, discriminant and convergent validity, and little relation to social desirability (r = .05; Rushton et al., 1981). In this study, coefficient alpha for the SRAS was .85.
Empathy. Participants completed the ACME, IRI, and BES, which are described in Study 1. Coefficient alphas ranged from .85 to .90 for the ACME scales, .65 to .75 for
Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS). Positive Affect and Negative Affect were assessed with the widely used 20-item PANAS (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988).
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
9
Vachon and Lynam Table 4. Study 2 (N = 703) Standardized Factor Loadings for the Final Three-Factor Model. ACME factor loadings ACME1r ACME3 ACME4 ACME9 ACME14r ACME15 ACME16 ACME25 ACME31r ACME33 ACME34 ACME35r ACME7 ACME8 ACME12r ACME13r ACME17r ACME22r ACME23 ACME24r ACME28 ACME29 ACME30 ACME32r ACME2r ACME5r ACME6r ACME10r ACME11r ACME18r ACME19r ACME20r ACME21r ACME26r ACME27r ACME36r
COG
Method factor loadings
RES
DIS
POS
NEG
Female
Male
Female
Male
Female
Male
Female
Male
Female
Male
0.801 0.586 0.591 0.632 0.768 0.573 0.660 0.808 0.689 0.671 0.863 0.799 — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
0.824 0.602 0.612 0.661 0.797 0.584 0.668 0.833 0.726 0.702 0.882 0.828 — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
— — — — — — — — — — — — 0.861 0.640 0.734 0.636 0.683 0.649 0.593 0.549 0.586 0.606 0.845 0.570 — — — — — — — — — — — —
— — — — — — — — — — — — 0.858 0.619 0.702 0.643 0.684 0.660 0.601 0.542 0.592 0.598 0.842 0.570 — — — — — — — — — — — —
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 0.512 0.560 0.552 0.721 0.727 0.490 0.567 0.550 0.693 0.455 0.402 0.488
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 0.515 0.559 0.544 0.700 0.706 0.515 0.576 0.551 0.687 0.453 0.494 0.488
— 0.444 0.415 0.257 — 0.517 0.494 0.098 — 0.189 0.069 — 0.375 0.454 — — — — 0.138 — 0.154 0.012 0.031 — — — — — — — — — — — — —
— 0.487 0.440 0.286 — 0.560 0.532 0.107 — 0.211 0.065 — 0.431 0.517 — — — — 0.162 — 0.181 0.014 0.037 — — — — — — — — — — — — —
0.205 — — — 0.042 — — — 0.153 — — 0.130 — — 0.362 0.260 0.414 0.393 — 0.379 — — — 0.265 0.479 0.533 0.455 0.133 0.066 0.511 0.627 0.592 0.409 0.577 0.481 0.577
0.200 — — — 0.055 — — — 0.125 — — 0.104 — — 0.316 0.226 0.364 0.344 — 0.332 — — — 0.230 0.429 0.483 0.408 0.117 0.059 0.460 0.579 0.539 0.368 0.521 0.428 0.525
Note. Unstandardized factor loadings are equal for men and women, but standardized factor loadings are presented for ease of interpretation. See Figure 1 for the full structural model. ACME = Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy; COG = Cognitive Empathy Scale; RES = Affective Resonance Scale; DIS = Affective Dissonance Scale; r = reverse-scored item
Coefficient alpha for the positive and negative factors were .84 and .83, respectively. Affective Lability Scale–Short Form (ALS-SF). Affective lability, the propensity for rapid shifts in emotion, was measured using an abbreviated measure of emotion dysregulation, the 18-item ALS-SF (Oliver & Simons, 2004). Coefficient alpha for the ALS-SF total score was .86. The
ALS-SF also has three subscales that represent the propensity to swing from anxiety to depression, from elation to depression, and from calmness to anger; alphas for these scales were .83, .78, and .75. Affective responding task. The affective empathy picture task used pictures from the International Affective Picture System (Lang, Bradley, & Cuthbert, 2005), a set of
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
10
Assessment
Table 5. College Norms for the Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy.
Total (n = 708) Male (n = 418) Female (n = 385) White (n = 562) Non-White (n = 226)a
Cognitive Empathy
Affective Resonance
Affective Dissonance
M
SD
M
SD
M
SD
51.80 50.89 52.79 52.58 50.32
9.32 9.61 8.91 9.46 8.81
56.83 54.15 59.75 58.50 53.62
9.07 8.98 8.24 8.41 9.16
56.24 52.79 59.98 57.67 54.07
10.04 9.78 9.78 9.44 9.56
Note. All Affective Dissonance items have been reverse scored so that higher scores on all three scales indicate greater empathy. Items are scored on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from Strongly disagree (1) to Strongly agree (5). Values represent sum of items, scored from 1 = Disagree strongly to 5 = Agree strongly. a. The 226 non-White participants include 60% Asian, 13% Black, 10% Hispanic, and 18% other.
evocative color photographs that have been widely used to study subjective, physiological, and behavioral responses to affective stimuli. In the current study, 20 pictures were selected that depict people expressing an emotion during positive events (10 pictures) or negative events (10 pictures). While viewing each picture, participants rated their emotional response on two, 7-point scales from very negative to very positive (pleasure dimension) and from very bored/ unstimulated to very awake/stimulated (arousal dimension). Physiological measures of pleasure and arousal are highly correlated with these self-report ratings. For example, facial electromyography activity covaries strongly with self-report pleasantness ratings (r = .90), and both skin conductance (r = .81) and the magnitude of late positive component in the event-related potential (r = .81) covary strongly with self-report arousal ratings (Cuthbert, Schupp, Bradley, Birbaumer, & Lang, 2000). Alphas for pleasure ratings were .80 and .74 for positive and negative pictures, respectively; alphas for arousal ratings were .78 and .89. Broad Autism Phenotype Questionnaire (BAPQ). A high-functioning autism phenotype was assessed using the 36-item BAPQ (Hurley, Losh, Parlier, Reznick, & Piven, 2007), which yields a total score and three subscale scores: Aloof Personality, Pragmatic Language, and Rigid Routine. Evidence suggests that the BAPQ has good internal consistency, stable factor structure, and high criterion validity in non-clinical samples (Ingersoll, Hopwood, Wainer, & Donnellan, 2011). Coefficient alpha for the total, Aloof Personality, Pragmatic Language, and Rigid Routine scales were .88, .87, .67, and .83, respectively. Self-Report Psychopathy Scale: Version III (SRP-III). A description of the SRP-III is provided in Study 1. Coefficient alphas for total, Interpersonal Manipulation, Callous Affect, Erratic Lifestyle, and Antisocial Behavior scales were .91, .81, .74, .83, and .62, respectively.
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale–Fourth Edition (WAISIV). Verbal and nonverbal intelligence were assessed using the Vocabulary and Block Design subtests of the WAIS-IV (Wechsler, 2008). The Vocabulary and Block Design subtests yield scores that are highly correlated with full-scale estimates of verbal (r = .78) and nonverbal (r = .73) intelligence. Testing was administered by two undergraduate interviewers, who were trained and supervised by an advanced graduate student and a professor. Scoring for the Block Design subtest was completed by the interviewers, and scoring for the Vocabulary subtest was conducted by the advanced graduate student. Emotional Expression Multimorph Task (Morph Task). The ability to detect facial expressions was assessed using a variant of the Morph Task (Blair, Colledge, Murray, & Mitchell, 2001). Prototypical emotional expressions taken from the valid and reliable pictures of facial affect (Ekman & Friesen, 1976) were blended together with pictures of neutral facial expressions to form a continuum of morphed images ranging from completely neutral (0% intensity) to full expression (100% intensity). For each of six basic expressions (happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, and surprise), participants sequentially viewed facial expressions at 20%, 30%, 40%, 50%, 60%, 70%, and 80% expression. At each viewing, the facial expression was displayed for 1 second before participants were asked to select an emotional expression from the six options listed on the screen. The outcome variable was the number of correct responses. An item was dropped from analysis if the accuracy for that item was lower than chance (16.6%) or so high that almost everyone got it right (>90%). This resulted in 6 to 12 item scales for each emotion. Coefficient alpha for total, happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, and surprise accuracy scales were .80, .62, .84, .87, .76, .74, and .74, respectively. Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Behavior, Postures subtest (DANVA2-POS). The DANVA2-POS (Pitterman & Nowicki, 2004) task consists of 24 full-body pictures of
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
11
Vachon and Lynam Table 6. Study 3 (N = 210) Pearson Correlations Between Empathy and Prosocial Behavior, Autism, Affective Responding, and Emotion Detection. Affective Empathy Prosocial Behavior SRA Altruistic Behavior Autism BAPQ Autism Phenotype Total Aloof Personality Pragmatic Language Rigid Routine Affective Responding Pleasure for Positive Pictures Pleasure for Negative Pictures Arousal for Positive Pictures Arousal for Negative Pictures Emotion Detection Facial Multimorph Task DANVA Postures Task
Cognitive Empathy IRI
BES
ACME
ACME DIS
ACME
IRI
BES
RES
.12
.24
.37
.11
.05
.18
−.19 −.09 −.12 −.21
−.17 −.09 −.16 −.13
−.35 −.29 −.31 −.21
−.19 −.22 −.12 −.08
−.07 −.12 .00 −.02
−.34 −.39 −.22 −.15
.16 .00 .21 .03
.15 .00 .18 .18
.19 −.08 .12 .14
.14 −.14 .21 .18
.19 −.14 .22 .20
.22 −.30 .27 .23
.05 −.12
.11 .17
.13 .17
.24 .11
.23 .02
.26 .27
.18 −.41 −.39 −.29 −.25 .14 −.15 .16 −.06 .19 .19
Note. All Affective Dissonance items have been reverse scored so that higher scores on all three scales indicate greater empathy. IRI = Interpersonal Reactivity Index; BES = Basic Empathy Scales; ACME = Affective and Cognitive Measure of Empathy; RES = Affective Resonance Scale; DIS = Affective Dissonance Scale (reversed); SRA = Self-Report Altruism Scale; BAPQ = Brief Autism Phenotype Questionnaire; IAPS = International Affective Picture System; DANVA = Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Behavior. p < .01 for bolded correlations.
models whose posture portrays happiness, sadness, anger, or fear. Models are dressed in black and their faces are obscured with a black oval so that judgments are made on the basis of posture alone. In this study, coefficient alpha for the DANVA2-POS was only .45; accordingly, items with item-total correlations below .20 were dropped, resulting in a 17-item measure with an alpha of .62. Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR). The BIDR is a 40-item measure of self-deceptive positivity and impression management (Paulhus, 1988). The BIDR exhibits good internal consistency, test–retest reliability, and concurrent validity with other measures of socially desirable responding. In this study, coefficient alpha for the total, Self-Deceptive Positivity, and Impression Management were .77, .67, and .72, respectively.
Results and Discussion Consistency of Empathy Measurement Across Samples. In the current study, relations among the scales of the ACME, IRI, and BES were nearly identical to those in Study 1 (intraclass correlation = .97). Empathy measures also bore comparable relations to the total and subscale scores of the SRP in Study 1 (intraclass correlation = .96). Furthermore, across all three studies, means for each empathy scale were equivalent (ps > .05), and the average change in alpha reliability
for the scales between studies was small (.04). This suggests that sampling and method differences between studies did not alter the way empathy measures worked. Associations between empathy and external variables. Table 6 presents zero-order correlations between each empathy scale and several constructs relevant to empathy that were not included in Study 1, such as prosocial behavior, autism phenotype, empathic responding, and empathic accuracy. Unlike Study 1, where dissonance was expected to provide an incremental contribution to the prediction of aggression and externalizing psychopathology, Study 3 correlations for the whole ACME measure are expected to be similar to correlations observed for other empathy measures. It is important that increasing the relation between empathy and aggression/externalizing does not come at the cost of reducing its relations to other important elements of the nomological net surrounding empathy. Across all measures, the ACME performed well. Correlations between the ACME cognitive scale and various outcomes—including altruism, autism phenotype (reversed), affective responding, and emotion detection—were at least as large as correlations for other cognitive measures. This was the case for zero-order correlations (average rs for ACME, BES, and IRI were .24, .15, and .09, respectively) as well as semipartial correlations (average srs for ACME, BES, and IRI were .16, .02, and .01, respectively). Correlations for
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
12
Assessment
Table 7. Study 3 (N = 210) Ruling Out Alternative Explanations for Empathy Relations. Affective Empathy
Cognitive Empathy
Alternative 1: Cognitive Empathy is just intelligence WAIS Verbal IQ (Vocabulary) WAIS Nonverbal IQ (Block Design) Alternative 2: Affective Empathy is just emotionality PANAS Positive Affect PANAS Negative Affect ALS-SF Affective Lability Anxiety/Depression Elation/Depression Anger Alternative 3: Self-reported empathy is just desirable responding BIDR Desirable Responding
IRI
BES
ACME
IRI
BES
ACME
ACME
RES
DIS
r r
.03 .07
.16 .12
.13 .11
— —
— —
— —
— —
r r r r r r
— — — — — —
— — — — — —
— — — — — —
.03 −.13 .03 .05 .04 −.03
−.05 .02 .08 .06 .09 .03
.07 −.14 −.19 −.08 −.14 −.26
.25 −.27 −.39 −.20 −.34 −.40
r
.29
.29
.05
.20
−.17
.07
.11
Note. All Affective Dissonance items have been reverse scored so that higher scores on all three scales indicate greater empathy. EFL = English as a first language; WAIS = Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale; IQ = intelligence quotient; PANAS = Positive and Negative Affect Schedule; ALS-SF = Affective Lability Scale–Short Form; BIDR = Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding. p < .01 for bolded correlations.
the ACME affective scales were also at least as large as other measures at both the zero-order level (average rs for ACME resonance, ACME dissonance, BES, and IRI were .24, .19, .12, and .09, respectively) and at the semipartial level (average srs were .14, .09, .02, and .01, respectively). Ruling Out Potential Confounds. An additional goal of this study was to determine whether associations between empathy and external variables were spurious—whether associations with cognitive empathy are explained by intelligence, whether associations with affective empathy are explained by emotionality, and/or whether associations with any type of self-reported empathy are explained by social desirability. Table 7 presents evidence against these alternative explanations, at least for the scales of the ACME. First, the cognitive scale of the ACME was not significantly associated with verbal or nonverbal intelligence.3 Second, the affective scales of the ACME were significantly correlated with emotional stability rather than lability. Finally, none of the three ACME scales was associated with desirable responding. Incremental Contribution of the ACME. The incremental contributions of the ACME, IRI, and BES as whole measures were estimated using a simultaneous analysis of sets. To calculate the unique contribution of the ACME, for example, the IRI and BES scales were entered in Step 1 and the ACME scales in Step 2; the change in R2 at Step 2 represents the incremental contribution of the ACME to the prediction of the dependent variable. Figure 2 presents the
results of these analyses: the ACME provided the largest increment in prediction across all outcomes, including various types of aggression, externalizing psychopathology, prosocial behavior, empathic responding, and emotion detection. Across these variables, the average unique contribution of the ACME (13%) was considerably larger than the contributions of the IRI (1%) and BES (1%).
General Discussion This investigation used 3 studies and 1,287 participants to establish the structural and external validity of the ACME. With regard to structural validity, exploratory analyses yielded three factors—one cognitive empathy factor and two affective empathy factors (resonance and dissonance). Across all three studies, these factors had similar means, internal consistencies, intercorrelations, and relations to important criteria. The three-factor structure of the ACME developed in Study 1 also demonstrated good fit in the large, independent sample used in Study 2. A very strong correlation between the affective resonance and dissonance factors suggest that they represent affective empathy subscales, and the superior fit of a strict invariance model indicating structural generalizability across sex, despite marked mean differences in levels of empathy. In terms of external validity, the ACME also fared well. The affective scales of the ACME—particularly the new dissonance scale—exhibited moderate to strong negative associations with various forms of aggressive behavior and
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
13
Vachon and Lynam
Figure 2. Incremental prediction of important outcomes: ΔR2 for the ACME, IRI, and BES when entered in the last step of a hierarchical regression.
externalizing behavior, supporting the hypothesis that limitations associated with other empathy measures may have reduced the meta-analytic empathy–aggression effect size reported by Vachon et al. (2014). Across all measures, the overall incremental contribution of the ACME (14%) was sizable compared with that of the IRI (1%) or BES (1%). These findings justify the need for a new measure of empathy and for a new affective empathy scale. Three possible confounds were also ruled out: intelligence, emotionality, and social desirability. First, some have suggested that cognitive empathy is an aspect of intelligence and that empathy training for offenders may be constrained by low intellectual ability (Jolliffe & Farrington, 2004). In the current study, ACME cognitive empathy was unrelated to intelligence. Second, low empathy is often paired with unemotionality in the child literature (e.g., callous-unemotional traits; Frick & White, 2008), so it is possible that high empathy is an expression of emotionality. In the current study, however, high affective empathy was associated with emotional stability rather than emotionality. Third, because empathy is a desirable characteristic, correlations between high empathy scores and undesirable characteristics (e.g., aggression, psychopathology, etc.) may be
explained by the effects of social desirability. In the current study, however, scores on all three ACME scores were unrelated to social desirability. There are some limitations to the current study. The most important limitation is that all three studies were conducted in college samples at a Midwestern university. Further validation efforts need to test the ACME in samples with a wider age range and more racial and ethnic diversity. It is also important to show that the ACME maintains its structure and nomological net in clinical populations and when it is translated into different languages. Another possible limitation is that a fairly large percentage of the sample in Study 3 had English as a second language, and that this may have affected the results of the study. However, there are several reasons why this may not be a concern: For both native and nonnative English speakers, mean scores on the ACME and other measures were not significantly different, differences in internal consistency estimates were small (average difference in α = .02), and relations among the various empathy scales were nearly identical (intraclass correlation = .98). Finally, a possible limitation of all self-report measures of cognitive empathy is that they ask individuals to rate their ability at detecting and understanding emotions rather than
Downloaded from asm.sagepub.com at Selcuk Universitesi on January 29, 2015
14
Assessment
directly testing this ability. This may be a problem both because of desirability effects and because self-reports are inappropriate for assessing cognitive abilities. In the current study, the ACME was not related to social desirability; however, the method question remains—are self-report and ability-based measures of cognitive empathy comparable? Preliminary research on emotional intelligence suggests that they may not be (Goldernberg, Matheson, & Mantler, 2006), but this remains a question for the field. Overall, the ACME is a promising new instrument for assessing various aspects of empathy. It is internally consistent and structurally invariant across samples and sexes. It is also resistant to the effects of social desirability and predicts important outcomes, including aggression and externalizing disorders; these predictions are generalizable across sex and incremental to other measures of empathy. Importantly, the ACME reconceptualizes empathy in a way that incorporates pathological manifestations of empathy (e.g., psychopathic callousness) and synchronizes it with contemporary thinking regarding its importance to violence. Given that empathy is a main character in theories of aggression, a core criterion for various externalizing disorders, and a primary area of focus in forensic treatment, it is imperative that the measurement of empathy catches up to its application. Declaration of Conflicting Interests The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Notes 1. Four items from the Antisocial Behavior subscale were dropped because of very low endorsement rates in college samples: Item 12, “I have assaulted a law enforcement officer,” Item 62, “I have close friends who served time in prison,” Item 63, “I purposely tried to hit someone with a vehicle I was driving,” and Item 64, “I have violated my probation from prison.” 2. Although it is difficult to specify precise cutoff points for fit indices, the following general rules of thumb were adopted in the present study (Byrne, 2012; Hu & Bentler, 1999): CFI/ TLI >.95 (good), .90 to .95 (borderline), and
