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Panel information
Panel 10. Health, Growth, Injury

Abstract

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Background: Compassion, defined as feeling touched by one’s sufferings and being motivated to help (Goetz et al., 2010), is constructive to psychological well-being. Despite the importance of compassion to psychological outcomes, most research take a variable-centered approach to examine its mechanism (e.g., Tarber et al., 2016). However, individuals may show different patterns of compassion and consequently link to varied psychological outcomes, which calls for person-centered approaches to find out. Previous studies of compassion profiles focus on self-compassion (e.g., Phillips, 2021). But compassion could be towards self and others, both of which are vital but distinct compositions of compassion. Therefore, our study aimed to identify compassion profiles based on self-compassion and compassion to others, and further examine how those different profiles were associated with individual psychological well-beings.
Methods: Our sample was composited of 1,921 participants (33.7% males; Mage = 19.26, SD = .89 years). Self-compassion was assessed by Self-Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003) and compassion to others was evaluated by Compassion Scale (Pommier et al., 2020). Participants’ psychological well-beings were assessed through measuring anxiety and depression (Symptom Checklist-90; Derogatis et al., 1973), interpersonal conflicts (Intragroup Conflict Scale; Jehn, 1995), and life satisfaction (Satisfaction With Life Scale; Diener et al., 1985). Due to existing arguments on the dimensions of self-compassion and compassion for others (Cleare et al., 2018), we first conducted Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) to explore the dimensions for both measures. Building on results of EFA, we explored the profiles of compassion using the Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) and further examined how different compassion profiles were associated with participants’ psychological well-beings through the correction method of Bolck, Croon, and Hagenaars (BCH; 2004).
Results: Results of EFA suggested two dimensions for self-compassion (self-coldness and self-compassionate) and two dimensions for compassion for others (coldness to others and compassionate to others). Based on the four indicators, five profiles were identified: low-compassionate (9.0%; low on both self-compassionate and compassionate to others), average (51.2%; all scores around the mean), high-compassionate (18.4%; compassionate to both self and others), uncompassionate (16.0%; being cold to both self and others), and inner-iron-external-warm (5.3%; being cold to self but compassionate to others). Further examinations on psychological well-being in different profiles suggested that inner-iron-external-warm group had the highest levels of anxiety (estimate = 2.02, SE = .34) and depression (estimate = 2.29, SE = .35), relatively high interpersonal conflicts (estimate = .79, SE = .33), but the lowest life satisfaction (estimate = 3.60, SE = .52). In contrast, among five groups, compassionate group had highest life satisfaction (estimate = 4.85, SE = .52), lowest scores on anxiety (estimate = .89, SE = .33), depression (estimate = .96, SE = .34), and interpersonal conflicts (estimate = .40, SE = .33). Low-compassionate group had better psychological well-beings than uncompassionate group in general.
Conclusions: Our findings call attention to take self-compassion and compassion to others together to identify profiles for intervention and prevention programs. Those who are compassionate to others still could run into psychological dysfunction if they are uncompassionate to themselves.

Author information

Author	Role
Haining Ren, Arizona State University	Presenting author
Nigela Ahemaitijiang, Center for Counseling and Psychological Development, Tsinghua University	Non-presenting author
Huiting Fang, School of Psychological and Cognitive Science, Peking University	Non-presenting author
Zhuo Han, Faculty of Psychology, Beijing Normal University	Non-presenting author

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