Stress Might Make You A More Empathetic Person

Once sufficiently stressed, the study subjects looked at photos of strangers who were undergoing a painful medical procedure and were asked to imagine how the patient in each photograph felt. For some of the images, researchers told the participants that the patient in the photo had received anesthesia, indicating that the person didn’t feel pain during the procedure. Researchers did this so they could determine whether the study participants’ reactions were to the image of the procedure or were based in an understanding of the patient’s experience.