What are the three types of empathy?

Empathy consists of three distinct types:

1. Emotional Empathy: This is the intuitive response where you can physically feel the emotions of others as if they were your own. For instance, feeling someone’s sadness or happiness just as they do.

2. Cognitive Empathy: Also known as perspective-taking, this type allows you to understand what someone else is going through and recognize their emotions, but not necessarily feel them yourself.

3. Empathic Concern (Compassion): This type involves the desire to help someone who is suffering or in need. It’s more action-oriented compared to emotional and cognitive empathy.

These three types of empathy do not always correlate within individuals, meaning someone can be high in one type of empathy but low in another 1.