Empathy in Adolescence.docx - Video Activity Empathy in...

Video Activity: Empathy in Adolescence
Empathy in Adolescence
This activity focuses on brain development during adolescence. Through video clips, recent findings
regarding the processing of emotional expressions are presented along with evidence supporting the
conclusion that the prefrontal cortex undergoes a disruptive maturational process during
adolescence.
No matter what emotion you feel – from the peaks of happiness to the depths of despair and
everything in between, the experience of emotion has three distinct components (Lewis & Haviland-
Jones, 2000):
 a physiological reaction – changes in your body;
 a cognitive component – a subjective understanding or labeling of the emotion;
 an expressive component – changes in your facial expression, voice, or body language.
The expressive component of emotion serves the important social role of broadcasting one’s
emotional state to other people. In order to operate with an effective communication system,
people must be able to recognize emotional expressions in others (Ekman, 1993). This ability to
perceive and recognize the emotional state of other humans is referred to as empathy .
On the following screens, match each photo of an adult with an emotion by selecting the correct
label for each photograph.
To investigate brain activity during the processing of emotional expressions that appear on others’
faces, researchers at Harvard Medical School showed photographs of emotional expressions to
teenagers and adults. While subjects viewed the photographs, they were in a