Empathic Intelligence: Teaching, learning, relating

By Roslyn Arnold: published by UNSW Press. Fax ++61 2 9964 5420

Cost A$39.95

Roslyn Arnold is currently Professor and Dan of Education and Head of School at the University of Tasmania. Prior to this she was at the University of Sydney.

This book is a welcome addition to the growing literature on ‘transformative pedagogies’. It aims to help teachers understand the concept of empathic intelligence so that they can both model and cultivate these qualities in students and use their knowledge to enhance more effective professional practice.

The first few chapters of the book focus on conceptualisations – what Ros Arnold understands by empathic intelligence. She defines this as ‘ a sustained system of psychic, cognitive, affective, social and ethical functioning’ and ‘essentially concerned with the dynamic between thinking and feeling and the ways in which each contributes to the making of meaning’ She puts a strong emphasis on the importance of both reflection and imagination in the development of empathic intelligence and these themes are revisited several times throughout the book.

Researchers in Australia have engaged in valuable enquiry into resilience and one of their findings has been the importance of a sense of belonging or ‘connectedness’. Arnold makes links between relationships and resilience in her excellent chapter on leadership but the subject matter perhaps deserves greater emphasis.

The final chapter is entitled “Creating empathically intelligent organizations’ and also stresses the importance of ‘inspirational’ leadership for change. This is an important chapter in exploring how to transform cultures to build empathic communities. Finally there is a useful checklist outlining the practical steps towards empathic intelligence.

Overall there are nuggets of gold in this book but I admit to a certain level of frustration in wanting these to shine brightly to catch the full attention of the reader rather than be somewhat buried in the wealth of material. Arnold tries to include so much in her book that it loses focus at times. A better production of the material would also have improved accessibility, perhaps by putting examples in boxes or a different font.

Roslyn Arnold is a distinguished Australian academic and by addressing these fundamental issues so emphatically she has added significantly to raising the profile of emotional literacy in education. As such this is an important text which all Australian educators need to read, especially those with any executive authority. Arnold makes it clear that empathic literacy is not only the foundation for general well being in schools but can also be the catalyst for the development of excellence in learning.

Sue Roffey September 2005