When will he learn to feel what I feel?

A 3-year old swats you with his hand in anger because you won’t let him have anymore candy. You tell him hitting hurts and to say sorry, but he won’t. Maybe you’ve had a discussion about sharing with a 2-year old, it’s virtues have been extolled 20 times and still… no sharing. Toddlers are just really bad at putting themselves in other people’s shoes. But guess what? You’re not raising a sociopath. Empathy takes time to develop.

Psychologists call the development of empathy in young children as “theory of mind”. This involves understanding that other people have thoughts, feelings and perspectives, other than our own. Until around age 4, children aren’t ready to develop theory of mind.

Researchers are studying this phenomena more closely. To test if a child already has theory of mind they create scenarios to check for their reactions to given situations.

In one test, a child is shown a bag of M&Ms, but inside there are pencils instead of the candy. A second child comes into the room (unaware of the switch in contents). Researchers ask the first child what he thinks the second will say is in the bag. Three-year-olds say “pencils,” because they know the pencils are there (so everyone else must know too). Four-year-olds say “M&Ms” because they think the other child will assume the bag is carrying its usual goodies.

Now empathy doesn’t develop overnight at age 4. Its roots can be seen even in babies. When an eight-month-old points at a dog and looks back at mom, she’s showing “joint attention”, a skill that means she is aware that Mom might enjoy seeing the cute animal too. Around 18 months, children start with pretend play — for instance, acting like a mommy and someone else is a baby — an indicator that they are aware of different people’s roles. But it’s not until around a child’s fourth birthday that he really grasps the fact that mommy and baby separate thoughts and feelings.

So empathy is a developmental milestone, just like learning to walk or babies developing eyes that see color. Language appears to play a role in how children develop empathy. The ones with richer language environments tend to pick up theory of mind earlier.

Adds another reason why talking to kids and responding to their emotional cues is important. Don’t worry, all that talk about sharing and hitting hurts will eventually make sense to him. Keep on telling them right from wrong, model good behavior and when his brain is ready… he’ll be ready to say sorry or better yet, not hit at all. Just keep up with the life lessons and little learning moments and you’ll get to empathy!

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