The relationship between empathy and support for rule changes intended to reduce the rates of concussions in the National Football League

Concussions can have daunting and relentless consequences. They are relatively common in sport, especially football (Kontos et al., 2004; Mack et al., 2021). Many concussions occur annually in sport; thus, research surrounding concussion prevention is imperative (Schweizer & Baker, 2022). One way to prevent concussions is to implement rules that make the game safer for the players. However, people, particularly fans may differ in their willingness to support such rule changes. Research suggests that empathy motivates individuals to engage in prosocial health behaviours (Masten et al., 2011). The aim of my research was to determine if fans are more supportive of concussion preventative rule changes if they feel more empathic toward athletes suffering from concussions. I conducted two studies to test the association between empathy and support for these rule changes. Study 1 tested a correlational relationship between National Football League (NFL) fans’ support for concussion preventative rule changes and their levels of empathy. The results supported the hypothesis that there was a positive correlation between support for rule changes and empathy. A second study was conducted to further explore the causal relationship between empathy and support for rule changes. Study 2 was an experimental study in which fans indicated their levels of support for concussion preventative rule changes in the NFL. However, prior to making these ratings, some participants read a scenario of an athlete who had suffered a concussion while following empathy-inducing instructions (empathy condition), some read the scenario while being instructed to keep an objective focus (objective condition), some read the scenario without any prior instructions (no instruction condition), and some did not read any scenario (control condition). The results showed that there was no statistically significant difference between the four groups on levels of support for the rule changes. However, through an e