When the body fosters empathy: The interconnectivity between bodily reactivity, meditation, and embodied abstract concepts.
Progress in Brain Research January 1, 2024 Fabio Marson, Revital Naor-Ziv, Patrizio Paoletti et al.
Empathy, the ability to infer others' emotions, is linked to bodily sensations from the autonomic nervous system. A survey of 581 participants found that people who meditate score higher on empathy than non-meditators. Lower autonomic reactivity in organs above the diaphragm was associated with higher empathy. Among participants with high autonomic reactivity, empathy was positively linked to interoceptive components of abstract concepts. The results suggest that meditation and low autonomic reactivity relate to empathy, possibly by downregulating autonomic responses.