Empathy

Empathy is a topic that gets students thinking about perspective-taking and emotional connection. These questions explore everything from everyday acts of understanding to broader discussions about compassion, conflict, and how we relate to people whose experiences differ from our own.

Questions are organized by level from beginner to advanced. A printable PDF of all the questions is available at the bottom of the page.

Beginner (A1-A2)

1. Who is someone you go to when you feel sad? What do they do that helps?
2. Who taught you how to care about other people’s feelings? What did they do?
3. When a friend is upset, what do you usually do? Do you listen or do you try to fix the problem?
4. What kind of person makes you feel comfortable when you are having a bad day? What do they say or do?
5. What do you usually do when you see a child crying in a store or on the street?
6. Do you have a pet or an animal you like? Are you kind to it?
7. When someone looks sad, how do you know? What do you see in their face or body?
8. If someone new comes to your school or workplace, what do you do to make them feel welcome?
9. What is something nice you like to do for your family or friends?
10. Have you ever helped someone you didn’t know? What did you do?
11. Do you think your friends are kind to you? What do they do that is kind?

Elementary (A2)

1. What jobs require a lot of empathy? Why is empathy important in those jobs?
2. Who is the most empathetic person you know? What do they do that makes you think they are so empathetic?
3. Are you good at knowing when something is wrong with a coworker or family member? How can you tell?
4. Do you cry when you watch sad movies or TV shows? What makes you cry?
5. What is the kindest thing a stranger has ever done for you? How did it make you feel?
6. What kinds of news stories make you feel sad or worried? Why?
7. When you see someone crying in public, what do you think? What do you do?
8. Have you ever felt bad for someone you didn’t like? What happened?
9. Have you ever said the wrong thing to someone who was upset? What happened?
10. Have you ever felt really happy because something good happened to someone else? What was the situation?

Intermediate (B1)

1. How much empathy do you feel towards other people?
2. Do you think it is possible to be too empathetic? Why or why not?
3. In what jobs is empathy a bad thing to have?
4. Do you think that people are born with empathy or are they taught it? Why do you think so?
5. If you see a homeless person on the street asking for money, what is the first thing you think about them?
6. What does the idiom “I feel your pain” mean? Have you ever felt someone else’s pain?
7. What kind of people are easy to feel empathy for? What kind are harder?
8. Do you feel more empathy for people or for animals? Why?
9. Do you think children have more empathy or less empathy than adults? Why?
10. What is something a friend has done for you that really meant a lot? Why was it so important?
11. Should schools teach children how to be more empathetic? Why or why not?
12. What do you think is harder: feeling empathy for someone who made a mistake, or someone who is just unlucky? How so?
13. When someone shares their problems with you, how do you usually respond? What makes that your natural approach?
14. Do you think it is harder to show empathy to someone whose life is very different from yours? How so?
15. If someone refuses to show empathy to others, should they still expect empathy when they need it? Why or why not?
16. What’s the hardest thing about being empathetic? Tell me about a time when you experienced that.
17. Do you think people today are more or less empathetic than in the past? What makes you think so?
18. If a close friend made a big mistake, would you be honest with them even if it might hurt their feelings? How would you handle it?
19. Some people say you should never judge someone until you have walked in their shoes. Do you agree? Why or why not?
20. Should leaders (like politicians or CEOs) be highly empathetic, or is it better if they focus on being strong and decisive? Why or why not?

Upper-Intermediate (B2)

1. What are the good and bad sides of a doctor having a lot of empathy?
2. Why do you think humans feel empathy? Do you think animals can feel empathy?
3. How does social media affect people’s ability to feel empathy for others they don’t know personally?
4. Compare how empathy is shown in your culture with how it is shown in another culture you know about. What are the biggest differences?
5. How has the way people express empathy changed over the past generation? What do you think caused those changes?
6. Compare empathy in personal relationships versus empathy in professional settings. What are the advantages and disadvantages of each?
7. What’s the relationship between empathy and forgiveness? Can you have one without the other?
8. How do people balance empathy with self-protection when dealing with someone who repeatedly hurts them?
9. How do cognitive empathy (understanding someone’s feelings) and emotional empathy (feeling what they feel) differ? Which one is more important?
10. What happens to a society when people lose the ability to empathize with others? Can you think of real-world examples where this has happened?
11. How do language barriers affect people’s ability to show empathy to each other? What can people do to bridge that gap?
12. How is the way children learn empathy different from the way adults develop it? What factors play a role?
13. In what ways can high empathy both help and harm someone’s mental health over time?

Advanced (C1)

1. People are often told to be empathetic, but companies and governments frequently make decisions that seem to ignore empathy completely. Why does this gap exist?
2. How might increasing empathy for distant strangers (through media) paradoxically decrease empathy for people in our immediate environment?
3. How does the commercialization of empathy in marketing and charity campaigns affect genuine empathetic responses in society?
4. In times of crisis, like a natural disaster or a pandemic, people often become more empathetic toward some groups but less empathetic toward others. Why does this happen, and what does it reveal about human nature?
5. When someone shares their struggles on social media and receives thousands of supportive comments, is that real empathy or just performance? How can you tell the difference?
6. Political leaders sometimes use empathy as a tool to gain support, but critics say this is manipulation. Where is the line between genuine empathy and using people’s emotions for political advantage?
7. We tend to feel more empathy for people who look like us, speak our language, or share our culture. How does this natural bias affect things like immigration policy, international aid, and media coverage?
8. AI chatbots and virtual assistants are now designed to sound empathetic. Does it matter whether empathy comes from a real person or a machine, and how might this change the way we think about human connection?
9. Throughout history, major social changes like ending slavery or giving women the right to vote required people to empathize with groups they had previously ignored. What makes some generations more willing to expand their empathy than others?
10. Nurses, social workers, and therapists are expected to be empathetic every day, but many of them eventually burn out and leave the profession. Why is constant empathy so exhausting, and what does this tell us about the limits of human empathy?
11. Parents today are often encouraged to validate their children’s emotions and be highly empathetic, but older generations say this makes children too soft. Who do you think has a point, and what are the real-world consequences of each approach?

PDF: Download a PDF of all the questions