I don’t know about that. I think a lot of kids feel empathy from a young age, and bullying behaviors are rather caused by a harsh environment and how they are treated by other people, especially parents.
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bluewing@lemm.ee 2 weeks agoI got no proof other than my personal experiences growing up and observing kids while teaching them in groups at a school.
Children by in large seem to have little empathy for others. Children have little to no problem with bullying others without any emotional issues. Even to the point of pushing other kids to suicide. They have little regard for others and even less control over maturity.
I think empathy is something that you develop as you grow older. It’s more a mark of adulthood than childhood.
hungryphrog@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 weeks ago
bluewing@lemm.ee 2 weeks ago
I’m not so sure. Children have a lot of desire and drive to monopolize an adult’s attention and resources. This I think gives any one child a leg up on getting the best resources to survive better. And you can see it when you work with a group of children. They will group around you jostling for the best position to be first and get the best from you. They do of course, get better with age and as they learn patience, but there is still a lack of empathy to be found in their base behavior.
After all, if you grew up with siblings, I’m quite sure your parents at some point in your early childhood told you “Be nice to your siblings! You love them!” more than once. Or some variation on that theme. And if you are a parent yourself, you have used that phrase at some point also. Because who has better reason to want to “kill” each other than brothers and sisters? They want to get as much of mommy and daddy as possible. Those resources are scarce and your natural drive is to fight to get them.
And hopefully, as children age they learn to get and show empathy to those around them. Most do, but some never quite manage it.
EnderMB@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Sadly, this is very similar of my wife’s understanding of teaching kids from 11-18. Emotional intelligence is very different from standard intelligence, and it develops at different times for different people.
Sometimes it’s a pure lack of empathy, and other times it’s simply not being able to understand that people have their own shit they’re dealing with. It can be simple stuff like bullying someone going through a rough time at home/school, or showing zero remorse when a kid they’ve assaulted goes blind due to brain damage because “the kid was a fucking dweeb”. Some of the stories I’ve heard second-hand are absolutely fucking tragic, even in good schools.