Compassionate Policy Support: The Interplay of Empathy and Values

Empathy and compassion are basic human responses that undergird altruistic behavior. Do they also motivate a desire to assist the needy and to support social welfare programs? We examine the role of empathic ability in shaping compassion and support for social welfare policies, and examine instances in which empathy and political values reinforce each other and when they conflict. We find that empathic ability substantially increases support for a specific welfare recipient and social welfare policies among people who reject individualistic explanations of economic outcomes. In contrast, there is a negative relationship between empathic ability and compassion for someone in need of government assistance among people who believe in individualism. This negative relationship reverses — empathic ability becomes positively associated with sympathy among individualists — when a needy person is being considered for charitable assistance. When empathic ability and values clash, individualists high in empathic ability seem to suppress and excessively down regulate their compassion. Our findings shed light on the ideological divide in support of government social welfare policy in the United States.