Empathy gap 2426628 180566738 2007-12-28T06:32:37Z Dravecky 4588674 wp link disambiguation An '''empathy gap''' is a [[cognitive bias]] in which a person does not empathize or predict correctly how he/she will feel in the future, i.e. what kind of [[emotion]]al state he/she will be in. The term ''empathy gap'' was coined by [[Harvard University]] psychologist [[Daniel Gilbert (psychologist)|Daniel Gilbert]]. One of the ideas behind the concept of ''empathy gap'' is that emotions [[biological evolution|evolve]]d in animals because that way they could react appropriately to situations in their environment, and individuals change their emotional states accordingly, but their [[affective forecasting]] is often affected by certain cognitive biases, which also include the so-called [[impact bias]], in which individuals inaccurately forecast the intensity of their possible emotions when a given event takes place. [[Category:Cognitive biases]] [[Category:Social psychology]] {{psych-stub}}