Ever made a New Year’s resolution to hit the gym five times a week, only to find yourself struggling to lace up your sneakers by February? Or promised yourself you’d never buy another gadget…right before the new iPhone hits the shelves? Chances are, you’ve fallen victim to the Empathy Gap.

1. What is Empathy Gap?

The Empathy Gap is our tendency to underestimate the influence of our “visceral drives” – those powerful emotions, urges, and physical states like hunger, pain, or sexual arousal – on our own attitudes, preferences, and behaviors. In simpler terms, it’s the disconnect between our “cold,” rational state and our “hot,” emotional state. When we’re calm and collected, we struggle to truly imagine how we’ll act when gripped by a strong emotion or physical need, and vice versa.

Psychologically, it’s rooted in the way our brains are wired. Our prefrontal cortex, responsible for rational thought and planning, has a harder time accessing and processing information from the limbic system, the emotional center. Evolutionary speaking, this separation might have been beneficial for quick decision-making in survival situations. Imagine a caveman faced with a tiger – no time for rational thought, just instinct! However, in the modern world, this separation can lead to poor choices.

2. Why We Fall For It

The mechanism behind the Empathy Gap is a combination of cognitive limitations and motivational factors. We often assume our current state will persist, a phenomenon called “projection bias.” We also tend to be overconfident in our ability to control our future behavior.

A classic experiment demonstrating this is the “cold-hot” decision-making study. Participants were asked to rate the attractiveness of donating to a charity when they were either feeling emotionally neutral or after watching a sad film clip. Those who had just watched the sad clip (the “hot” state) were more likely to donate and estimate that they would donate more in the future. When asked again in their “cold” state, their willingness to donate plummeted, revealing the gap between their anticipated and actual behavior.

Think about dieting. When you’re full and satisfied after a healthy meal, resisting a sugary treat seems easy. You confidently declare, “I’ll never eat cake again!” But when you’re stressed, tired, and craving something sweet, that willpower often vanishes. The future “you,” hungry and tired, is a different person than the present “you,” full and content.

3. Examples in Real Life

The Empathy Gap rears its head in all sorts of situations:

• Hiring Decisions: A manager interviewing a candidate for a stressful, high-pressure role might underestimate how the candidate will actually perform under real pressure. The manager’s calm, controlled interview environment doesn’t accurately reflect the candidate’s likely behavior during a crisis. This can lead to hiring someone who looks good on paper but crumbles under stress.
• News Consumption: When feeling anxious or angry, we are more likely to consume news that confirms our existing biases, reinforcing those emotions. We underestimate how much our emotional state is driving our media choices and believe we’re objectively seeking information. This fuels polarization and echo chambers.
• Health Decisions: Patients recovering from surgery often underestimate the level of pain they will experience later, leading to inadequate pain management and increased risk of addiction to painkillers. Similarly, smokers often underestimate the cravings they’ll experience when they attempt to quit.

4. Consequences of the Bias

Allowing the Empathy Gap to dictate our decisions can lead to:

• Distorted Judgment: We make poor predictions about our future behavior and the behavior of others, leading to ineffective planning and unrealistic expectations.
• Polarized Opinions: By underestimating the emotional factors driving opposing viewpoints, we struggle to understand and empathize with others, increasing societal division.
• Undermined Learning: When we dismiss past mistakes based on a current “cold” state, we fail to learn from them. “I can’t believe I did that! I’d never do that again!” is a common refrain that ignores the power of future “hot” states.

5. How to Recognize and Reduce It

Recognizing and mitigating the Empathy Gap requires self-awareness and proactive strategies:

• Mental Questions: Ask yourself: “How might I feel in the future when I’m stressed, tired, or hungry? How might someone else feel in this situation?” Actively try to anticipate potential emotional or physical states.
• Devil’s Advocate Thinking: Consciously consider opposing viewpoints and actively challenge your assumptions about your own and others’ behavior.
• Pre-Mortems: Before making a decision, imagine that you’ve failed and ask yourself: “What went wrong? What visceral drives might have influenced my choices?”
• Exposure to Opposing Views: Deliberately seek out information and perspectives that challenge your current beliefs. This helps you understand the emotional landscape of those who disagree with you.

6. Cognitive Biases That Interact With This One

The Empathy Gap doesn’t operate in isolation. It often interacts with other cognitive biases:

• Projection Bias: As mentioned earlier, this bias fuels the Empathy Gap by leading us to believe that our current state will persist. We project our current feelings and preferences onto our future selves, further underestimating the influence of “hot” states.
• Optimism Bias: This is the tendency to overestimate the likelihood of positive events and underestimate the likelihood of negative ones. Combining this with the Empathy Gap can lead to overly optimistic predictions about our ability to resist temptations or cope with stress in the future.

7. Conclusion

The Empathy Gap is a powerful cognitive bias that can significantly impact our decision-making and our ability to understand ourselves and others. By acknowledging its existence and employing strategies to mitigate its effects, we can make more informed choices, build stronger relationships, and navigate the complexities of human behavior with greater empathy and understanding.

Challenge: This week, pay attention to a situation where you’re making a decision about the future (e.g., planning your schedule, setting a goal). Ask yourself: “Am I currently in a ‘cold’ state? How might my emotions or physical needs change in the future, and how might that influence my behavior?” Consciously account for the potential Empathy Gap before committing to your decision.