The ability to understand and share another person’s feelings is called empathy, and it’s important for healthy and mutually beneficial social interactions, allowing us to build strong relationships and support others. Unfortunately, not everyone has this humane ability—here are 18 personality traits that indicate someone lacks the ability to emphasize.
Egocentrism
Empathy requires understanding others and acknowledging different perspectives and experiences—something an egocentric person cannot do. Empathetic people often focus on their own needs and feelings and show minimal interest or insight into others. This can manifest as dominating the conversation, talking about themselves, and failing to ask questions or listen.
Can’t Recognize Emotions
Medical News Today explains that Alexithymia is the official term for being unable to experience, identify, or express emotions. Although it can occur with autism, it isn’t a mental disorder and is common in people who lack empathy. They might misinterpret your facial expressions, fail to notice your tone of voice, or ignore subtle emotional cues, making them seem insensitive.
Won’t Take Responsibility
People with low empathy often struggle to admit wrongdoing or take the blame because they tend to be self-serving and disinterested in their behavior’s negative impact on others. Typical responses include shifting blame, making excuses, or being evasive when it comes to taking responsibility for mistakes. This can damage relationships and cause resentment.
Bullying
It makes sense that people who can’t empathize are more likely to be aggressive and cruel. Greater Good Magazine claims most research supports this, and most bullies cannot experience the thoughts and feelings of others as if they were their own. A lack of empathy means a greater likelihood of engaging in behaviors like teasing, intimidation, or physical aggression.
Lack of Compassion
Empathy requires understanding of and genuine concern for the suffering of others. People who can’t emphasize often seem unreactive to emotional events that those around them suffer, like personal tragedies, illness, or misfortune. They may change the subject to their own lives instead of offering any support or words of comfort and often seem cold and uncaring.
Poor Social Skills
The average person doesn’t like someone who can’t emphasize, so they often struggle to make friends and build relationships. They may seem socially awkward, insensitive, unnecessarily selfish, or self-obsessed, making it difficult for others to connect with them (even if they want to, which they probably don’t!) As a result, unempathetic people can be ‘loners’ or social outcasts.
Unsupportive
Empathy allows most of us to offer support and comfort when others are upset or experiencing challenging events. Very Well Mind claims a lack of empathy often results in confusion when others are anxious, sad, or anxious, and they frequently fail to acknowledge such feelings or act appropriately. They might offer unhelpful advice, be dismissive, or ignore the situation entirely.
Manipulation
When you only acknowledge your own feelings and needs, exploiting people doesn’t seem unethical. Non-empathic individuals frequently use manipulation tactics to get what they want from others and might use someone’s good nature or vulnerabilities for their own selfish gains. Afterward, they rarely show remorse because they cannot perceive the suffering of others.
Impulsiveness
An empathic person may resist engaging in certain gratifying activities (like casual sex and criminal activities) because they consider the adverse effects and show restraint when it comes to doing things that may harm or distress others. People low in empathy tend to be more impulsive and fail to plan for the future or consider the ramifications of their actions.
Can’t Regulate Emotions
According to Psychology Today, “Individuals with low cognitive empathy could not reduce the impact of the tendency toward anger and aggression.” An intense focus on their own feelings and a disregard for the impact that their actions have on others makes them prone to angry, jealous, or frustrated outbursts, making them emotionally volatile and sometimes violent.
No Ethical Boundaries
Someone who lacks empathy may regularly do things that an average person finds morally deplorable or socially unacceptable. This is because they cannot effectively consider how other people will feel or respond, so they act in ways that are rude, untrustworthy, or just plain wrong! They might fail to understand any social implications and rarely show remorse if they cross ethical boundaries.
Don’t Offer or Accept Apologies
A sincere apology requires an understanding of the impact of one’s actions on another person, making low-empathy individuals particularly bad at saying sorry when appropriate. They may hesitate to offer apologies or struggle to understand why one is necessary. They might also find it hard to accept apologies from others, incorrectly perceiving them as insincere.
Blaming the Victim
Victim-blaming occurs when a person suffering misfortune, injury, illness, or abuse is made to feel responsible for their own suffering. While this can sometimes apply, non-empathic people blame the victim unnecessarily and can be dismissive or cruel, neglecting the role of external factors or the emotional impact of the event (regardless of blame).
Disinterest
People who lack empathy tend to be self-centered and often lack interest in the lives of others unless they directly impact their own. They usually have minimal curiosity in events or conversations that don’t involve them and rarely ask questions or make small talk. Discussions may feel one-sided and often end when the person is done talking about themselves.
Prejudice
Without empathy, people cannot understand or accept people that are different to them, often resulting in racism, sexism or other social discrimination. Low empathy individuals may hold strong prejudices or biases towards certain groups of people based on their own narrow-minded perspective. This can manifest as disrespectful behavior or hate speech based on hurtful stereotypes.
Gloating
If you don’t understand or care about the feelings of others, it’s easy to be thoughtlessly boastful and celebrate your own successes without humility. When they win, non-empathic people tend to draw attention to themselves insensitively or mock the losers. When they fail, they often make excuses for their performance, accuse others of cheating, or sulk.
Remorseless
Feeling guilty means understanding that your actions cause harm or distress to someone else, and this is something that requires empathy. Those who lack the ability to recognize emotions either don’t feel remorse or dismiss the feeling quickly, typically by blaming the victim or other people or by minimizing their role or the emotional impact wrought.
Vanity
Everyone cares about their image to some extent, but people low in empathy can be preoccupied with maintaining perfection. This preoccupation with self-image comes from being self-centered and wanting to appear strong, confident, and dominant at all times. Because they can’t read emotions, they often use appearances as a measure of someone’s worth.
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