A sharing of the negative or painful feelings of another. It involves being sensitive to another’s emotions or emotional state, even though one’s own situation is different. For example, I may be empathetic when I see a friend in pain, even though I recognize that I am not actually in pain myself. Thus, it is the ability to place oneself in the role of another that provides information on how the other may feel or think without directly being informed.
See Empathizing/empathy, Mirror neurons, Moral judgments, Social Skills Improvement System (SSIS), Theory of the child’s mind (ToM)