Early empathy development: Concern and comforting in 9- and 18-month-old infants from Uganda and the UK

Vreden, C, Buryn-Weitzel, JC, Atim, S, Donnellan, E, Hoffman, M, Holden, E, Jurua, M, Knapper, CV, Lahiff, NJ, Marshall, S, Paricia, J, Tunçgenç, B ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1135-1004, Tusiime, F, Wilke, C, Slocombe, KE and Clay, Z, 2025. Early empathy development: Concern and comforting in 9- and 18-month-old infants from Uganda and the UK. PLOS One, 20 (5): e0320371. ISSN 1932-6203

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Abstract

Empathy, the capacity to share and understand others’ emotional states, is important for navigating our social lives, yet its development in infancy remains poorly understood. Moreover, most research on empathy development has been biased towards Western populations, which are not representative of global diversity. Using a cross-cultural longitudinal design, this study investigated how infants at 9 and 18 months sampled from Uganda (N = 44, 24 female) and the UK (N = 49, 24 female) develop empathic concern and comforting. Infants watched an adult (mother or experimenter) pretend to injure themselves and the infants’ concerned facial expression and comforting behaviours towards the injured individual were recorded. By 9 months of age, infants at both sites exhibited evidence of facial expressions of concern and onset of comforting behaviour. The likelihood of comforting at both sites increased by 18 months. Results were overall similar at both sites, but we found some site level variation in tendencies to offer comfort spontaneously, with infants in Uganda being more likely to comfort after an explicit cue of need than infants in the UK. Overall, results highlight early onset of empathy development in infancy, with similar developmental trajectories in two sites, despite differences in socio-cultural environment.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	PLOS One
Creators:	Vreden, C., Buryn-Weitzel, J.C., Atim, S., Donnellan, E., Hoffman, M., Holden, E., Jurua, M., Knapper, C.V., Lahiff, N.J., Marshall, S., Paricia, J., Tunçgenç, B., Tusiime, F., Wilke, C., Slocombe, K.E. and Clay, Z.
Publisher:	Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Date:	2 May 2025
Volume:	20
Number:	5
ISSN:	1932-6203
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1371/journal.pone.0320371 DOI 2471125 Other
Rights:	© 2025 Vreden et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Jeremy Silvester
Date Added:	18 Jul 2025 09:11
Last Modified:	18 Jul 2025 09:11
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/53981

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