PERSPECTIVE article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Human Developmental Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1575249
This article is part of the Research TopicMoral Emotions Scrutinized: Developmental, Clinical and Neuroscientific AspectsView all 3 articles
Rethinking Empathy Development in Childhood and Adolescence: A Call for Global, Culturally Adaptive Strategies
Provisionally accepted
- 1Al-Amal Psychiatric Hospital, Emirates Health Services (EHS), Dubai, United Arab Emirates
- 2Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
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Empathy – the ability to recognize, understand, and respond to others’ emotions – is fundamental to human development and mental health. It unfolds across the lifespan, shaped by a complex interplay of biological maturation, social learning, and cultural context. Despite its universal importance, current clinical, educational, and policy frameworks often fail to integrate empathy-building interventions, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where resource constraints and cultural barriers hinder progress. This paper argues for a paradigm shift toward scalable, culturally adaptive strategies to foster empathy in diverse settings. We review developmental trajectories of empathy from infancy through adolescence, highlighting critical periods and influences, and examine practical interventions including caregiver–infant programs, school-based social-emotional learning (SEL), and clinician empathy training. We also address cross-cultural variations, proposing a framework to embed empathy-driven initiatives within healthcare, education, and policy. By prioritizing culturally sensitive, evidence-based approaches, global mental health systems can enhance therapeutic relationships, strengthen prosocial development, and address empathy gaps at a structural level. This perspective underscores an urgent need for interdisciplinary collaboration to position empathy as a cornerstone of global mental health initiatives.
Keywords: Empathy, development, childhood, global mental health, culture, Social-emotional
Received: 12 Feb 2025; Accepted: 04 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Sultan and Khan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Meshal A Sultan, Al-Amal Psychiatric Hospital, Emirates Health Services (EHS), Dubai, United Arab Emirates
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