Until now, little was scientifically known about the human
potential to cultivate compassion — the emotional state of caring for people
who are suffering in a way that motivates altruistic behavior.
A new study by researchers at the Center for Investigating
Healthy Minds at the Waisman Center of the University of Wisconsin-Madison
shows that adults can be trained to be more compassionate. The report, recently
published online in the journal Psychological Science, is the first to
investigate whether training adults in compassion can result in greater
altruistic behavior and related changes in neural systems underlying
compassion.