“It’s a Process:” How Faculty Develop and Adopt Empathetic Practices

ABSTRACT

Empathy and empathetic classroom practices are a pillar of good pedagogy. These approaches create a learning environment that is adaptable and supportive for all. Building on a small but growing body of literature on the role of empathy in higher education, we explore the genesis of how faculty, across a range of disciplines, began to incorporate empathetic practices into their teaching. Our data come from interviews with 29 faculty members collected between the Spring of 2021 and the Spring of 2022. Our findings indicate that some faculty trace their empathetic practices back to their own educator models, or to their upbringing, while others espouse that their empathy is “naturally” occurring, and still others have had experiences in the classroom that led them to change their pedagogical approach to be more empathetic. Understanding how faculty learn about and implement empathy is important for sociologists because empathy is socially constructed. Empathy has been shown to help students embrace difficult content and have tough conversations. Empathy also helps students connect to faculty and improves student retention.

KEYWORDS:

• Empathy
• higher education
• pedagogy

Acknowledgments

We thank Lainey Collins, Lauryn Hill, Kamryn Schmidt, and students in the Spring 2022 section of SOC 532: Qualitative Methods for their help with data collection and analysis.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Colleen E. Wynn

Colleen E. Wynn is an assistant professor, co-director of the Community Research Center, and graduate program director of the Master of Arts in Applied Sociology program in the Department of Sociology at the University of Indianapolis. Dr. Wynn’s research focuses on housing, neighborhoods, families, and pedagogy. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4958-9429

Elizabeth Ziff

Elizabeth Ziff is an assistant professor and co-director of the Community Research Center in the Department of Sociology at the University of Indianapolis. Dr. Ziff’s research focuses on the sociology of reproduction, medicalization, families, gender, and pedagogy. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5511-5583

Allison H. Snyder

Allison H. Snyder is an assistant professor of data analytics in the School of Business at the University of Indianapolis and the faculty lead of the Master of Science in Data Analytics. Her research focuses on the teaching of analytics and the application of analytics, methodology, and tools in various fields. ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0165-5629