The Relationship between Empathy and Intelligenee in Kindergarten Children

The present investigation was designed to examine the relationship between empathy and intelligence in kindergarten children. 35 kindergarten children (mean age of 5yr. 7mo.) were administered the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC) and then their empathy was measured. In the assessment of empathy 5 was presented three colored-pictures told a story composed of three pictures. Three sets of three pictures were constructed for each of the following four emotional situations : angry, fear, happy, and sad. After the presentation of each story, E asked 5 to state how he felt about the emotional reaction of the central figure. The degree of empathy was scored 0, 1, 2 points based on Ss' statements. 10 of 35 & were selected fron highest end of the distribution of the empathy scores (HE group) and were selected from the lowest end (LE group). The VIQ, PIQ, FIQ, and the scores of the subtests of HE group were compared with those of LE group. The main results obtained were as follows : (1) Between HE group and LE group there was no statistically significant difference in the VIQ, PIQ, and FIQ. (2) In the HE group, the PIQ was significantly higher than the VIQ. (3) The mean score of the object assembly test for HE group was significantly higher than that for LE group. From these results of the present study, it may safely be concluded that the ability of understanding the relation between the whole and the parts is an important factor of empathy in kindergarten children