Empathy and Juvenile Crime

"Mirror neurons are specialized cells that fire whether the monkey is itself performing an activity or simply observing another performing it. Thirty years of research strongly suggests that humans also have mirror neurons, and they may be the basis for empathic responses when we see another person's emotion or action."

"Empathy can motivate action in both negative and positive directions. In a trial, for example, jurors can be moved toward guilty verdicts or acquittals. Trial lawyers on both sides of a case attempt to stir up empathy strategically for their client so that the jury is more likely to see things on the side of the victim or the perpetrator."

"Empathy, our capacity to feel the inner experience of another, underlies much of our behavior and the choices and decisions we make. It is a more powerful teacher than its cousins, sympathy and compassion, in which we feel deeply for rather than with another, because the feelings it generates are so strong."

Empathy, the capacity to feel the inner experience of another person, is a powerful force shaping behavior and decisions. Unlike sympathy and compassion, empathy generates stronger feelings because it involves feeling with rather than for another. Neuroscience reveals empathy involves multiple emotional and cognitive processes using ancient brain structures. Mirror neurons, discovered in monkey studies during the 1990s, are specialized cells that activate both when performing an action and when observing others perform it. Research strongly suggests humans possess mirror neurons that may underlie empathic responses to others' emotions and actions. Empathy motivates action in both positive and negative directions, influencing outcomes in legal proceedings and inspiring prosocial behaviors.

Read at Psychology Today