ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the descriptive diagnostics of empathic capacity. To this end, we will again discuss what empathy is, doing so first by demarcating what it is not. The more precise the description, the more accurately empathic capacity can be diagnosed. The method of evaluating empathic capacity will then be addressed: which questions can the evaluator ask in order to get information, and how should this information be interpreted. One illustration of the extent to which empathic capacity is underappreciated as an important phenomenon in the psychological health of adolescents is the lack of an entry for empathy in hefty Dutch youth psychiatry manuals. The term empathy has become increasingly broad, and in daily use it often corresponds to identification, sympathy, being nice, interest or friendliness. In a diagnostic framework, it is important that empathy is not used in such a broad sense.
