ABSTRACT
This chapter explores much about empathy created by Heinz Kohut's defining the limits of psychoanalysis as set by the empathic-introspective approach. Stanley L. Olinick regards empathy as neither mystical nor unscientific; rather, it is the ordinary means by which the analyst's work ego attempts to reestablish an investigative contact. He builds his thesis on a careful distinction between empathy and sympathy. Pinchas Noy, like Olinick, does not portray empathy as a scientifically loose concept, vague or readily subject to idiosyncratic misuse. Basing his conception on the suggestions of Kohut and Winnicott, James S. Grotstein applies his dual-track theory to an understanding of empathy. Finally, full circle, Stephen L. Post and Jule P. Miller's 'Apprehensions of Empathy', in which they build directly on the theories of self psychology. They address the challenge to Kohut's view by critics who state that empathy is minimally accessible to objective measurement and that emphasis on empathy encourages deviations from psychoanalysis.
