UX design and empathy: are we doing it right?

We hear the term ‘user empathy’ floating around the design world a lot these days. But are we really clear on what exactly that means? How many of us are really confusing empathy with sympathy or even pity and are we doing it right?

As designers, user experience researchers and user interface designers, we sometimes get so lost in the doing; conducting our research, compiling it, synthesizing it into deliverables and trying to come across as though we care, that we lose sight of the actual feeling aspect of what it actually means to be empathic.

What exactly is Empathy?

Let’s be clear on what Empathy is and is not. Empathy is not sympathy nor pity nor compassion.

Pity — Usually suggests a kindly, but sometimes condescending, sorrow aroused by the suffering or ill fortune of others. It tends to have a negative connotation in which you think less of the individual, their situation or suffering.

Sympathy — Used to convey commiseration or feelings of sorrow for someone else who is experiencing misfortune. You feel bad for them but may not know what it’s like to be in their shoes.

Empathy — Used to refer to the capacity or ability to imagine oneself in the situation of another, experiencing the emotions, ideas, or opinions of that person or perhaps conjuring up a similar experience that has happened to you. Seeing things from the point of view of the other by truly imagining being in their position and trying to feel what they are feeling.

Compassion — Is associated with an acknowledgment and experience of, caring about and active desire to alleviate the suffering of another.

Intention is everything

The concepts above all have to do with varying degrees of caring, engagement and the intention behind it.

Pity is the most detached and distant and often carries a sense that the suffering is acknowledged but looked down upon.

Sympathy has a different level of intent in which you may really care to hear…