The crystal globe: emotional empathy and the transformation of self.
Consciousness and Cognition September 1, 2012 Christopher T Burris, John K Rempel
Reading a tragic news story about a needy other tended to increase self-reported mystical experiences. Among men, a history of mystical experience was associated with greater empathy, but this empathy was not connected to the mystical experiences they reported during the study. For women, a history of mystical experience did not predict empathy overall, but their empathy was linked to in-the-moment experiences of oneness, absorption, and space-time distortion with religious significance. The findings suggest emotional empathy may be tied to altered perceptions of self in relation to others and context.