The perceived cost of empathy reduces empathic reactions to a friend (Study 1-3)

This dataset is from "The perceived cost of empathy reduces empathic reactions to a friend" (Study 1-3). People may find it difficult to empathize with an intimate other and use the strategy of avoiding the costs of empathizing. In this study, we found that in two of the three vignettes (vignettes 1 and 3), participants in the cost condition showed lower empathy for the target person and higher personal distress than those in the control condition. In Study 2, we used only vignettes 1 and 3 and replicated the main findings of Study 1. In vignette 1, perceived closeness and self-other distinction did not differ significantly between the cost and control conditions. In vignette 3, perceived closeness was greater in the control condition than in the cost condition. One interpretation of this inconsistent finding is that perceived closeness is not associated with empathy when the target person (e.g., a friend) is already a close person. In Study 3, we used a within-participant design and only Vignette 1. Results showed that the perceived cost of empathy reduced both positive and negative empathy.本数据集源自论文《共情感知成本会削弱对好友的共情反应》（The perceived cost of empathy reduces empathic reactions to a friend）中的研究1至研究3。个体往往难以对亲密他人产生共情，并会采取规避共情成本的策略。本研究发现，在三个情境小故事（vignette）中的两个（即情境1与情境3）中，成本组被试对目标对象的共情水平更低，且报告的个人困扰（personal distress）程度高于对照组被试。在研究2中，我们仅使用了情境1与情境3，重复验证了研究1的核心发现。在情境1中，成本组与对照组的感知亲密感（perceived closeness）和自我-他人区分（self-other distinction）程度均无显著差异。在情境3中，对照组的感知亲密感显著高于成本组。针对这一不一致的研究结果，一种解释是：当目标对象（如好友）本身已是亲密关系时，感知亲密感与共情水平并无关联。在研究3中，我们采用了被试内设计（within-participant design），且仅使用了情境1。结果显示，共情感知成本会同时削弱正向共情与负向共情。