Vínculo de apego, estilos parentales y empatía en adolescentes / Attachment, parental styles and empathy in adolescent

Resumen El objetivo de la presente investigación fue estudiar las relaciones entre la percepción del vínculo del apego, de las relaciones parentales y los aspectos cognitivos y emocionales de la empatía en un grupo de adolescentes. Se utilizaron los formatos para madre y padre de las adaptaciones argentinas de la Escala de Seguridad de Kerns y de la versión abreviada del Inventario de la percepción de los hijos acerca de las relaciones con sus padres para adolescentes (CRPBI; subescalas: aceptación, control patológico y autonomía extrema). Se utilizó como medida de empatía, la validación argentina del Índice de Reactividad Interpersonal (componente cognitivo: Toma de Perspectiva y Fantasía; componente emocional: Preocupación Empática y Malestar Personal). Los varones manifestaron menores puntajes totales en el IRI respecto de las mujeres (p ≤ .001). Los adolescentes que experimentaron un apego alto hacia su madre y padre percibieron más aceptación en la relación parental con ellos (p ≤ .001; p ≤ .001) y presentaron mayor empatía (p= .018; p= .016). Al igual que los adolescentes que percibieron un estilo parental caracterizado por la aceptación con su madre y padre (p= .008; p= .001). Experimentar un apego seguro en la adolescencia podría depender de percibir una relación interpersonal con los progenitores basada en la aceptación de su individualidad e implicación positiva. El establecimiento de un vínculo de apego seguro y percibir la aceptación como práctica parental permite el desarrollo de la empatía.

Abstract The aim of this investigation was to study the relationship among the perception of attachment, parenting relationships, and emotional and cognitive aspects of empathy in a group of adolescents. In order to measure adolescents' perception of the relationship with their parents we used the formats for mother and father of the Argentinean adaptations: (1) Kerns' safety scale, and (2) the abbreviated version of the Children's Report on Parent Behavior (CRPBI); subscales: acceptance, pathological control and extreme autonomy. The Argentine validation of the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (cognitive component: Taking Perspective and Fantasy, emotional component: Empathic Concern and Personal Distress) was used as the empathy measure. Considering the total score obtained on the Kerns safety scale, respect to the maternal and paternal figures, high attachment perception groups (mean ≥ + 1 SD) and low attachment perception groups (mean ≤ - 1 SD) were formed. Correlations between parental styles and empathy with the Spearman test were evaluated. Mean comparisons were made with the Mann Whitney U test: on the one hand, between gender and empathy; on the other, among adolescents who perceived a low and high attachment with both parents in relation with empathy and parental styles. Males reported lower total IRI scores in the subscales: fantasy, empathic concern and personal distress (respectively: p ≤ .001; p ≤ .001; p ≤ .001; p ≤ .001) as compared to adolescent women. The females that experienced a high attachment towards their parents perceived higher acceptance rate in the relationship with them (p ≤ .001; p ≤ .001). They also showed higher empathy (p = .018; p = .016) and obtained higher scores in the dimensions of the IRI: perspective taking (p ≤ .001; p = .006) and empathic concern (p = .024; p = .022). The adolescents who perceived a more tolerant parenting style showed themselves more empathic (p = .008; p = .001). In addition, the parental style of extreme autonomy with their mother and their father was negatively associated with the total scores of the IRI (p = .006, p ≤ .001), fantasy (p = .011; p = .017) and empathic concern (p ≤ .001; p ≤ .001). Parents with less years of schooling use parenting practices based on punitive and coercive control. The female gender was characterized by an empathic emotional response, although both genders have a similar cognitive ability to understand or take the perspective of the other. However, women react more affectively. These differences can be attributed to socialization stereotyped patterns of male and female parenting that assign to women greater emotional sensitivity. Experiencing a secure attachment in adolescence may depend on perceiving an interpersonal relationship with parents based on the acceptance of their individuality and positive involvement. These results match with several investigations, which show that parents perceived as available and with democratic parenting styles, based on the acceptance of adolescents, establish with their children a secure attachment bond, which is associated with a greater psychosocial adjustment. Experiencing a relationship based on acceptance, on affective and committed reciprocity with significant adults that show first empathy and emotional attunement with their children, is a requisite for adolescents to understand the perspective of others and identify with experience, to feel compassion and concern the discomfort of others. Establishing a secure attachment bond and perceiving acceptance as a parental practice allows the development of empathy, protective factor of aggression and promoter of adolescent prosocial behavior.

Neural Correlates of Cognitive and Emotional Empathy in Patients with Autism Spectrum Disorder

OBJECTIVES: Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are considered to have problems with empathy. It has recently been suggested that there are two systems for empathy; cognitive and emotional. We aimed to investigate the neural response to cognitive and emotional empathy and elucidate the neurobiological aspects of empathy in patients with ASD. METHODS: We recruited patients with ASD (N=17, ASD group) and healthy controls (HC) (N=22, HC group) for an functional magnetic resonance imaging study. All of the subjects were scanned while performing cognitive and emotional empathy tasks. The differences in brain activation between the groups were assessed by contrasting their neural activity during the tasks. RESULTS: During both tasks, the ASD group showed greater neural activities in the bilateral occipital area compared to the HC group. The ASD group showed more activation in the bilateral precunei only during the emotional empathy task. No brain regions were more activated in the HC group than in the ASD group during the cognitive empathy task. While performing the emotional empathy task, the HC group exhibited greater neural activities in the left middle frontal gyrus and right anterior cingulate gyrus than the ASD group. CONCLUSION: This study showed that the brain regions associated with cognitive and emotional empathy in ASD patients differed from those in healthy individuals. The results of this study suggest that individuals with ASD might have defects both in cognitive empathy and in emotional empathy.

Evidências de validade da versão portuguesa do indice de reatividade interpessoal para casais / Validity evidence of the portuguese version of the interpersonal reactivity index for couples / Evidencia de validad de la versión portuguesa del indice de reactividad interpersonal en parejas

Este estudo teve como principal objetivo traduzir e adaptar para língua portuguesa o Índice de Reatividade Interpessoal para Casais (IRIC), analisando as propriedades psicométricas da versão portuguesa. Esse é um instrumento de avaliação da empatia em casais, que resultou da adaptação de uma das mais usadas escalas de empatia, o Índice de Reatividade Interpessoal de Davis, para o contexto das relações íntimas. O IRIC avalia dimensões de empatia cognitiva (tomada de perspetiva) e emocional (preocupação empática), importantes para a estabilidade e satisfação das relações conjugais. A escala original foi traduzida para português e administrada a 148 sujeitos que estavam numa relação amorosa há pelo menos um ano. A maioria dos sujeitos eram mulheres com uma média de idades de 27 anos. Os resultados revelam uma estrutura fatorial semelhante à escala original, valores adequados de consistência interna (alfa de Cronbach=0,82) e bons níveis de validade externa com uma escala de ajustamento diádico.

The main objective of this study was to translate and adapt the Interpersonal Reactivity Index for Couples (IRIC) to Portuguese, and analyze the psychometric properties of the Portuguese version. This instrument that assesses empathy in couples, resulted from the adaptation of one of the most widely used empathy scales – Davis´s Interpersonal Reactivity Index – for the context of intimate relationships. The IRIC assesses dimensions of cognitive (perspective taking) and emotional (empathic concern) empathy, both essential for stable and satisfactory marital relationships. The original scale was translated to Portuguese and administered to 148 participants involved in an intimate relationship with a minimum duration of one year. Most of the participants were women, with a mean age of 27 years old. Our results revealed the Portuguese version has a factorial structure similar to the original version, adequate internal consistency values (Cronbach’s a=.82), and good external validity with a scale of dyadic adjustment.

El principal objetivo de este estudio fue traducir y adaptar a la lengua portuguesa el Índice de Reactividad Interpersonal para Parejas (IRIP), analizando las propiedades psicométricas de la versión portuguesa. Este es un instrumento de evaluación de empatía en parejas, que resultó de la adaptación de una de las más usadas escalas de empatía, el Índice de Reactividad de Davis, para el contexto de las relaciones íntimas. El IRIP evalúa dimensiones de empatía cognitiva (toma de perspectiva) y emocional (preocupación empática), importantes para la estabilidad y satisfacción de las relaciones conyugales. La escala original fue traducida al portugués y administrada a 148 sujetos que mantenían una relación amorosa desde hace por lo menos un año. La mayoría de los sujetos eran mujeres con una edad media de 27 años. Los resultados revelaron una estructura factorial semejante a la escala original, valores adecuados de consistencia interna (Cronbach’s a=.82) y buenos niveles de validación externa con una escala de ajustamiento diádico.