It's also due to a lack of properly functioning mirror neurons which light up when we feel empathy which is why people with autism also don't do the contagious yawn thing. Guess who just had a psych test about this stuff
I feel like a condition for having empathy is having experienced some sort of hardship personally. I've had a blessed life and the worst thing that's happened to me is falling off my bike. I can certainly try and imagine what it's like to suffer from say...a breakup, but I actually have no idea.
Thus, I have zero empathy. You can tell me the best sob story and I'll have sympathy for you, but I can't and won't feel what you're feeling.
empathy is not feeling EXACTLY what people feel, its being able to relate on some level. like when you read a book and feel some pain when the main characters family gets offed. like, ive never had children, but i can feel that dread knot in my gut just fine when someone i know has lost a child.
What's it called when I only feel empathy for those I care about? I can read for hours about ISIS executions and serial killers and watch videos of parents confronting their child's killers in court, and the only thing I'll feel is a sort of sadistic glee knowing that the killers will someday get what they've done ten times over.
we're naturally built to have "tribes" so its normal to not have the same feelings for distant people. most the people who react strongly to these things do so because something about the people has made them a part of their "tribe"... like military caring about other military who die.. because they can relate, the similarity makes them part of the "tribe". back to my example of my friends loosing kids, i don't feel the same about strangers loosing kids, unless i actually concentrate on humanizing them as people i could know, but a person WITH kids might relate more instantly because "mommies" becomes a type of "tribe" its also the same reason its so easy for people to hate large groups (like the current hate hardon people have for muslims) because they immediately become an unrelateable tribe and not humans with families that just happened to be born in an area where they were raised calling god a different name and reading a different book.
typically if you concentrate on an individual and think about them and their life and imagine what their day to day is like you will almost immediately start to feel more real empathy for them
Thus, I have zero empathy. You can tell me the best sob story and I'll have sympathy for you, but I can't and won't feel what you're feeling.
I never yawn when people yawn O_O