The relations of emotionality and regulation to dispositional empathy-related responding among volunteers-in-training

Individual differences in emotional intensity and regulation have been post ulated to influence vicarious emotional responding, which, in turn, has bee n posited to affect helping behavior. These relations were investigated in a sample consisting primarily of adults who were training to be volunteers at two sites (N = 200). As hypothesized, negative emotional intensity was a positive predictor of dispositional sympathy and personal distress but did not predict perspective taking. Consistent with our expectations, regulati on was a positive predictor of dispositional sympathy and perspective takin g and was an inverse predictor of personal distress. The relation between n egative emotional intensity and dispositional personal distress was moderat ed by perspective taking; as perspective taking increased, the strength of the positive relation between negative emotional intensity and personal dis tress decreased. In an exploratory analysis, the likelihood of starting a v olunteer position was observed to decrease as negative emotional intensity increased. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.