Post by warsaw on Dec 16, 2011 6:40:50 GMT -9
Many people find it easier to empathise with animals and cars than homeless people and drug addicts, psychologists claim
Many people find it easier to empathise with animals and even cars than they do with homeless people and drug addicts, a new study has claimed.
And the findings by Duke University in North Carolina and Princeton University in New Jersey could shed light on the acts of notorious monsters like Hitler, Pol Pot and Stalin, who dehumanised their victims before embarking on torture and genocide.
New findings reveal how easily we can dehumanise those we consider beneath us, to the point where we’re able to forget that they also have feelings.
For this reason they believe many people ‘will easily ascribe social cognition - a belief in an internal life such as emotions - to animals and cars, but will avoid making eye contact with the homeless person on the street’.
They asked more than 100 students to respond to pictures of various different people. An image of a firefighter made participants feel proud, while seeing a picture of a disabled woman made them feel pity.
Merciless: Hitler dehumanised his victims
However, pictures of a homeless woman and male junkie provoked feelings of disgust. Volunteers were then asked to imagine a day in the life of each person they’d looked at, before being hooked up to an MRI scanner and shown the pictures again.
Results, published in the Journal of Psychology, revealed that the part of the brain involved in social interaction still failed to respond to images of people generally regarded as undesireable, such as the homeless, drug addicts, immigrants and poor people.
Study author Professor Lasana Harris said: ‘When we encounter a person, we usually infer something about their minds. Sometimes, we fail to do this, opening up the possibility that we do not perceive the person as fully human.
‘The result is what we call ‘dehumanised perception,’ or failing to consider someone else’s mind. Such a lack of empathy toward others can also help explain why some members of society are sometimes dehumanised.
‘What’s especially striking is that people will easily ascribe social cognition - a belief in an internal life such as emotions - to animals and cars, but will avoid making eye contact with the homeless person on the street.
‘These results suggest multiple roots to dehumanisation. This suggests that it is a complex phenomenon, and future research is necessary to more accurately specify this complexity.’
Co-author Professor Susan Fiske added: ‘We need to think about other people’s experience. It’s what makes them fully human to us.’
Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2074645/Many-people-easier-empathise-animals-cars-homeless-people-drug-addicts.html#ixzz1giFNq6C0
Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2074645/Many-people-easier-empathise-animals-cars-homeless-people-drug-addicts.html#ixzz1giF9sTrk
Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2074645/Many-people-easier-empathise-animals-cars-homeless-people-drug-addicts.html#ixzz1giEyarIf
Many people find it easier to empathise with animals and even cars than they do with homeless people and drug addicts, a new study has claimed.
And the findings by Duke University in North Carolina and Princeton University in New Jersey could shed light on the acts of notorious monsters like Hitler, Pol Pot and Stalin, who dehumanised their victims before embarking on torture and genocide.
New findings reveal how easily we can dehumanise those we consider beneath us, to the point where we’re able to forget that they also have feelings.
For this reason they believe many people ‘will easily ascribe social cognition - a belief in an internal life such as emotions - to animals and cars, but will avoid making eye contact with the homeless person on the street’.
They asked more than 100 students to respond to pictures of various different people. An image of a firefighter made participants feel proud, while seeing a picture of a disabled woman made them feel pity.
Merciless: Hitler dehumanised his victims
However, pictures of a homeless woman and male junkie provoked feelings of disgust. Volunteers were then asked to imagine a day in the life of each person they’d looked at, before being hooked up to an MRI scanner and shown the pictures again.
Results, published in the Journal of Psychology, revealed that the part of the brain involved in social interaction still failed to respond to images of people generally regarded as undesireable, such as the homeless, drug addicts, immigrants and poor people.
Study author Professor Lasana Harris said: ‘When we encounter a person, we usually infer something about their minds. Sometimes, we fail to do this, opening up the possibility that we do not perceive the person as fully human.
‘The result is what we call ‘dehumanised perception,’ or failing to consider someone else’s mind. Such a lack of empathy toward others can also help explain why some members of society are sometimes dehumanised.
‘What’s especially striking is that people will easily ascribe social cognition - a belief in an internal life such as emotions - to animals and cars, but will avoid making eye contact with the homeless person on the street.
‘These results suggest multiple roots to dehumanisation. This suggests that it is a complex phenomenon, and future research is necessary to more accurately specify this complexity.’
Co-author Professor Susan Fiske added: ‘We need to think about other people’s experience. It’s what makes them fully human to us.’
Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2074645/Many-people-easier-empathise-animals-cars-homeless-people-drug-addicts.html#ixzz1giFNq6C0
Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2074645/Many-people-easier-empathise-animals-cars-homeless-people-drug-addicts.html#ixzz1giF9sTrk
Read more: www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2074645/Many-people-easier-empathise-animals-cars-homeless-people-drug-addicts.html#ixzz1giEyarIf