Background
Aggression is usually defined as behavior deliberately aimed to harm individuals and/or objects [
1]. One construct of interest related to the development and manifestation of pathologic aggression is empathy. Empathic individuals are thought to use information about emotional states in others to constrain potentially harmful behaviors and to inhibit antisocial and aggressive acts [
2,
3]. The experience of empathy is associated with helping and comforting others [
4]. Adequate empathic responding is an important aspect of reciprocal human relationships and represents an essential component of moral and social development [
5]. Empathy is defined as a complex interpersonal phenomenon in which observation, memory, knowledge, and reasoning are combined to give insights into the thoughts and feelings of others [
6]. It comprises the perception and the affective response of the emotional state of someone else [
7,
8]. Contemporary conceptualizations of empathy have emphasized the distinction of cognitive and affective components [
5,
9]. According to Jolliffe and Farrington [
10] affective empathy is specified as ‘affect congruence’ and cognitive empathy as ‘the understanding of another’s emotions’. The distinction of cognitive and affective empathy components represents a promising step to disentangle the multilevel construct of human empathy.
Despite the assumptions about the relevance of empathy deficits for the development and manifestation of aggressive behavior, meta-analyses indicate that empirical research does not clearly support a significant relationship between empathy and aggression. In their meta-analysis, Vachon et al. [
11] concluded that empathy and aggression share only a small amount of variance. Earlier, Lovett and Sheffield [
12] summarized that findings on the association between affective empathy and aggression in children and adolescents are inconsistent. Eisenberg et al. [
13] reported that empathy is only moderately associated with aggressive behavior. Interestingly, recent research revealed that cognitive and affective empathy subcomponents are differently associated with subtypes of disruptive behavior in children and adolescents [
14‐
16]. Therefore, the expected association between empathy and aggression may only apply to specific forms of aggression.
One important differentiation of aggressive behavior is the distinction between reactive and proactive aggression introduced by Dodge and Coie [
17]. Reactive aggression is described as an impulsive response to a perceived threat or provocation, often associated with high emotional arousal, anxiety, and anger. Proactive aggression is described as instrumental, organized, cold-blooded, and motivated by the anticipation of reward [
17,
18]. A number of studies have documented different associations of the two aggression subtypes with cognitive and affective variables [
19]. Based on the motivational underpinnings of the two subtypes of aggression, it can be assumed that empathy is differentially involved in the inhibition of reactive and proactive aggression. Accordingly, it has been proposed that for reactive aggression, emotional over-arousal disturbs inhibition mechanisms usually triggered by empathy [
12]. Neurodevelopmental models of empathy [
20‐
22] further substantiate this assumption. These models emphasize that adequate emotion regulation is a prerequisite for the experience of empathy. Because deficient emotion regulation is a core feature of reactive aggression, empathy is less likely to be involved in the inhibition of this subtype of aggression. In contrast, planned and controlled acts of aggression are more likely to be inhibited by earlier experiences of empathy. In line with these assumptions, Kimonis et al. [
23] showed that reduced responding to emotional stimulation is associated with proactive aggression in non-referred girls and boys. Moreover, proactive aggression in the form of bullying has been associated with lower levels of affective empathy in male and female adolescents [
24]. Nonetheless, Feshbach and Feshbach [
25] have argued that empathy hinders both types of aggression. Moreover, a recent investigation with healthy adults showed that both types of aggression are negatively associated with cognitive and affective empathy [
26]. A study with children with autism spectrum disorder and healthy controls indicated that empathy is associated with reactive but not with proactive aggression [
27]. Overall, empirical findings on the association between empathy and reactive and proactive aggression are heterogeneous. At present it remains unclear if empathy is equally associated with neither, one, or both forms of aggression in children and adolescents.
One major issue in research investigating associations of reactive and proactive aggression is the high correlation between the two aggression subtypes. Across different samples investigations have reported correlations between .4 and .9 [
28]. Moreover, individuals showing proactive aggression only, are usually difficult to identify. While primarily reactive aggressive individuals have often been characterized, individuals high on proactive aggression are usually also high on reactive aggression [
29]. Consequently, the value of the differentiation between reactive and proactive aggression has been questioned and it has been argued that proactive aggression is simply an indication of a more severe aggressive behavioral pattern [
30]. Therefore, identifying correlates of reactive and proactive aggression with other variables might not be sufficient to support the usefulness of the dichotomy in clinical practice. It has been suggested that it is important to apply methods controlling for the co-occurrence of each aggression subtype. Recent research has applied person-centered group comparisons to solve this issue. These studies have compared individuals with meaningful profiles of reactive and proactive aggression [
29,
31,
32].
Although the reactive-proactive aggression distinction has been acknowledged in some studies investigating the empathy-aggression relationship, studies comparing cognitive and affective facets of empathy between clusters of adolescents with meaningful aggression profiles are still scarce. Mayberry and Espelage [
32] applied this approach, but did not find the expected differences in empathy between identified aggression clusters. One limitation of the study by Mayberry and Espelage [
32], and most other studies investigating the empathy-aggression relationship, has been that participants with elevated levels of aggression were not included in the samples. This has made it difficult to draw conclusions about the involvement of empathy dysfunction in pathologic aggressive individuals [
12]. Especially for the development of clinical interventions that aim to reduce aggressive behavior, it seems important to understand if empathy is related to subtypes of aggressive behavior and which empathy subcomponents should be the focus of such intervention programs.
Another important topic regarding the empathy-aggression relationship is gender. Girls usually show less severe aggressive behavior [
33], and are less likely to develop aggression related disorders [
34]. For reactive and proactive aggression, recent studies also report significant gender differences with boys scoring higher than girls on both types of aggression [
35,
36]. Further, research indicated that associations of reactive and proactive aggression with future psychopathology differed between boys and girls [
37]. Gender differences have also consistently been reported for empathy [
2]. Girls usually score higher on self and other-reported measures of cognitive and affective empathy [
10,
38]. In adolescent samples, gender differences are usually more distinct for affective than for cognitive empathy [
39,
40]. Of notice, studies that have investigated gender differences in empathy mostly did not acknowledge levels of aggressive behavior within their subjects. An interesting question is, whether girls and boys with comparable levels and similar profiles of aggressive behavior differ in empathy in a way non-aggressive youth do. To our knowledge, differences between girls and boys within clusters of adolescents with meaningful aggression profiles have not been investigated yet.
Aim of the present study
Since successful social interactions during adolescence have a large impact on socio-emotional functioning, a better understanding of the interrelation between empathy and aggression during that age period appears especially relevant and is an important subject of investigation. Given the heterogeneous findings and limitations of previous investigations on the aggression-empathy relationship, the present study aimed to further advance the knowledge in the field by investigating the following research questions: (1) Are cognitive and affective empathy associated with reactive and proactive forms of aggression? (2) Do clusters of aggressive adolescents, with meaningful aggression profiles differ in cognitive and affective empathy? (3) Do girls and boys within aggression clusters differ in cognitive and affective empathy? Based on previous empirical findings and theoretical assumptions regarding the motivational underpinnings of reactive and proactive aggression, for our first study question we hypothesized that cognitive and affective empathy are negatively associated with proactive aggression but not with reactive aggression. For our second study question, we firstly derived clusters of adolescents with distinct aggression profiles. We expected to find a low aggression, a reactive aggression only, and a reactive-proactive aggression cluster. We hypothesized to find significant differences between emerging aggression clusters on cognitive and affective empathy. For our third study question we compared girls and boys within derived aggression clusters on cognitive and affective empathy. In line with previous research showing gender differences in empathy we hypothesized that within the low aggression and the reactive aggression only cluster, girls differ significantly from boys on affective empathy. Contrary, we expected that in adolescents with elevated levels of proactive aggression affective empathy to be reduced, irrespective of gender. Therefore, we assumed to find smaller and non-significant differences in affective empathy between girls and boys within the cluster of adolescents with elevated levels of proactive aggression. Since previous research did not consistently report gender differences on cognitive empathy in adolescents, we hypothesized that girls and boys within all aggression clusters show similar scores on cognitive empathy.
Discussion
The present study extends previous research by evaluating the associations between cognitive and affective empathy and reactive and proactive aggression in adolescents. The study advances the field by investigating these associations in a sample of adolescents with elevated levels of aggression, and by comparing scores on cognitive and affective empathy between adolescents with distinct aggression profiles. Results showed that cognitive and affective empathy were significantly associated with proactive aggression, but not with reactive aggression. Cluster analysis yielded three clusters with meaningful profiles of reactive and proactive aggression that differed significantly on cognitive, affective, and total empathy scores. Within aggression clusters gender difference on empathy varied. Girls and boys within the reactive-proactive aggression cluster did not differ significantly on cognitive, affective, and total empathy. Whereas within the low and the reactive aggression cluster girls scored higher on affective empathy. Findings allow conclusions to be drawn on the interrelations of theoretically distinct aggression subtypes and different empathy facets.
With our first study question we investigated if cognitive and affective empathy are associated with reactive and proactive forms of aggression. In line with our hypothesis, we found negative associations between cognitive and affective empathy and proactive aggression. Our results confirmed other research indicating that proactive aggression [
13] and bullying [
45] are related to lower levels of empathy. Hence, according to our data lower scores on cognitive and affective empathy are associated with higher levels of aggression that is instrumental, organized, and motivated by the anticipation of reward. Our results further affirmed the hypothesis that reactive aggression is only marginally related to cognitive and affective empathy. We based our assumption on the specific characteristics of reactive aggression. Reactive-aggressive individuals are characterized by impaired emotion regulation [
46] and reduced cognitive control under emotional stimulation [
47]. Our results support a recent study showing that proactive but not reactive aggression is negatively associated with feelings of guilt in children [
36]. Results of hierarchical regression analysis in the present study showed that cognitive and affective empathy explained additional variance of proactive aggression, beyond that afforded by reactive aggression, age, and gender. Of note, this was not the case for reactive aggression. This finding further confirmed our expectations regarding the associations between aggression subtypes and empathy facets. By showing that empathy is associated with proactive but not with reactive aggression, our study fosters a better understanding of the empathy-aggression relationship. Interestingly, regression analysis revealed a significant unique predictive value of affective empathy, while cognitive empathy did not uniquely add to the prediction of proactive aggression. This affirms the assumption of an empathy imbalance in proactive aggressive individuals [
48]. Inconsistent findings on the association between empathy and aggression in previous studies are possibly due to insufficient differentiation of aggression subtypes and empathy subcomponents. Our findings indicate that the more specifically these concepts are defined and assessed the better their relationship can be understood. It is also possible that earlier studies reported only marginal associations between empathy and aggression, because samples with high levels of aggression were not included in a number of investigations, as has been criticized in recent reviews [
11,
12]. To address this gap in the literature, we recruited a sample that was expected to show high levels of reactive and proactive aggression. In fact, reactive and proactive aggression scores of the reactive-proactive aggression and the reactive aggression clusters were comparable or even higher than in studies applying the same measure in antisocial juvenile populations [
18,
44,
49]. Nonetheless, associations between proactive aggression and empathy in the present study were only of medium effect size. Lovett and Sheffield [
12] argue that behavioral or experimental measures of empathy indicate stronger relationships with aggression. Thus, it would be interesting to assess if our results can be replicated using experimental paradigms that differentiate between cognitive and affective empathy. The development of such performance-based experimental paradigms is an important subject for future research.
The second aim of our study was to compare cognitive and affective empathy in adolescents with distinct aggression profiles. In summary, the reactive-proactive aggression cluster scored lower on affective, cognitive, and total empathy than the reactive aggression, and the low aggression cluster. The reactive aggression and the low aggression cluster did not differ on cognitive, affective, or total empathy. Our results are in line with previous studies that have reported empathy deficits in aggressive children and adolescents with disruptive behavior disorders using questionnaires, story vignettes, and experimental paradigms [
50‐
53]. By using a statistical approach that allowed us to identify clusters of adolescents with meaningful aggression profiles, instead of comparing dichotomous study groups, our results support the utility and importance of the distinction between reactive and proactive aggression for research investigating the interrelation of empathy and aggression. Further, our study results confirm clinical assumptions about the relevance of empathy deficits in adolescents with high levels of reactive and proactive aggression. Surprisingly, although the low aggression and the reactive aggression clusters had almost identical mean scores on affective empathy, post hoc comparisons indicated that only the reactive aggression cluster differed significantly from the reactive-proactive aggression cluster, while the difference between the low aggression and the reactive-proactive aggression sclusters was only marginally significant. Of note, inspection of age and gender corrected estimated mean scores indicated that covariates had a larger influence on the group comparison between the low aggression and the reactive-proactive aggression cluster.
With our third study question we aimed to test whether girls and boys with similar aggression profiles differed on affective, cognitive, and total empathy. Our results showed that only in the low aggression cluster girls scored significantly higher on affective and total empathy. Although in each aggression cluster girls had higher scores than boys on affective and total empathy, descriptive statistics also indicated that differences on empathy measures between girls and boys within the reactive-proactive aggression cluster were smaller. This indicates that previously reported gender differences in empathy are less prominent in adolescents with aggressive behavior, especially when girls also show proactive aggression. Possibly, girls prone to show proactive aggressive behavior are less likely to experience positive reinforcement for empathic behavior and therefore show less affective empathy than non-aggressive girls. Further, the gender intensification theory by Hill and Lynch [
54] indicates that girls and boys intend to act in ways that are consistent with gender-specific role expectations. Therefore, girls are usually encouraged to act emotionally responsive and show affective empathy, whereas boys tend to downplay such behaviors. Since institutionalized girls might have different gender role expectations, due to different peer group influences and a deviant socialization background, the direction of the hypotheses made by the gender identification might not apply for girls living in juvenile justice institutions. In line with our hypothesis and previous investigations in adolescents applying the same instrument, we did not find differences between girls and boys on cognitive empathy. Even for the entire study sample, gender differences on cognitive empathy were small. This finding further implicates the importance of the differentiation of cognitive and affective empathy subcomponents for future investigations.
Limitations
The study has several limitations that should be mentioned. First, we used self-report to assess aggression and empathy. Using self-report for the assessment of the constructs under investigation has advantages and drawbacks. Social desirability is often a problem when self-report is used to measure aggressive behavior. Nonetheless, we used the RPQ in its self-report form for two reasons: (1) the self-report version has excellent psychometric properties [
18,
44,
49] and (2) we expected adolescents to have the best knowledge of their general aggressiveness during the past six months. We chose the BES for similar reasons. The questionnaire has very good psychometric properties [
10] and has been applied in multiple cultural settings and different languages [
39,
40,
55]. Further, current research shows that self-report questionnaires capture empathy validly [
56]. This appears comprehensible, since empathy is primarily an internal emotional process, rather than an observable behavior. Second, the differentiation of empathy into cognitive and affective components represent only one approach to disentangle the multilevel construct. Vachon and Lynam [
26] recently introduced a new measure of empathy that assesses cognitive empathy and two subtypes of affective empathy (i.e., affective resonance and affective dissonance). The authors showed that aggressive behavior in healthy adults is more strongly associated with affective dissonance than with affective resonance. Hence, empathy questionnaires for children and adolescents might also need additional revision in this direction. Third, adolescents living in child welfare and juvenile justice institutions are characterized by a unique sociodemographic background [
42]. Therefore, the results need to be carefully interpreted and replications of our findings are required before these can be generalized to other populations. Fourth, it is plausible that the age- and the gender-composition of the sample influenced the present findings. Both variables need to be considered as confounds in empathy research because differences have been reported [
57]. We therefore controlled for the influence of gender and age in the hierarchical regression models and in the group comparisons. Of notice, hierarchical regression analysis showed that cognitive and affective empathy improved the prediction of proactive aggression beyond that afforded by age and gender in the regression models and gender distribution did not differ across derived aggression clusters. Nonetheless, statistical control is never an optimal replacement for experimental control. Thus, our results need to be verified in larger samples that allow gender and age specific investigations of our study-questions. Fifth, the present study is cross-sectional, which does not allow inferences about causality and the temporal stability of the associations indicated by our data. Sixth, sample sizes were different for gender comparisons within aggression clusters which reduced power for some of the group comparison.
Authors’ contributions
FE conceived and designed the study, collected data, was responsible for the statistical analyses, and wrote all drafts of the manuscript. CSTE conceived and designed the study, collected data, and edited the final manuscript. CSTA supervised all phases of the research project, approved the design, and edited the final manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.