ing on a child's affective empathy. Based on previous research, it was hypothesized that children would exhibit higher levels of empathy after hearing a story with a sympathetic, school-aged protagonist than when simply asked questions from an empathy measure. Method Participants Participants were 17 children between three and five years of age (12 boys and 5 girls, mean age 4 years, 5 months). Participants were obtained through a preschool affiliated with Earlham College, a local community center, and through contacting faculty, staff, and community members by word of mouth. All parents and guardians were told all details of the study in a letter in advance, and all children participated with their parent's knowledge and written consent. Parents were provided with the results at the conclusion of the experiment. Materials Participants were read a picture book, Hooway for Wodney Wat, (Lester, 1999). The children were also given the Young Children's Empathy Measure (Appendix A), developed by Robert Poresky (1990). The Young Children's Empathy Measure (YCEM) consisted of four verbally presented vignettes, each designed to elicit one of four emotions: sadness, fear, anger and happiness. The children were then asked two questions after each vignette. "How does the child feel?" was used to measure each child's cognitive perspective, and "How do you feel about this?" was used to measure each child's affective perspective. Procedure The children were each visited individually three times by the experimenter. Visits were conducted either in the child's preschool or home, and the same location was used in each session. In the first session, the YCEM was administered and answers were recorded, to establish a baseline empathy score for each child. The second session took place on a different day, and the experimenter read the story to the child. Immediately afterward, the YCEM was administered a second time, and a second score was recorded. The st...
