Empathy, Listening Skills,
and Touching Another Heart

About the Author

Before proceeding with my, Lawrence J. Bookbinder, Ph.D.'s, qualifications for writing this website on empathy, listening skills, acknowledgments, emotional intimacy, good relationships, and happy marriages, here is some information which you may find useful at this point:
  • The table of contents contains a brief description of every chapter.
  • There is a short version of this website on empathy and listening skills.
  • I run a discussion board on the subject of this website.
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Credentials   oooooooo

I was awarded a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Northwestern University in 1959, earned licenses to practice in Michigan and California, and later became a Fellow of the Division of Psychotherapy of the American Psychological Association. After practicing clinical psychology for over thirty years, I retired.

During my career, some of my activities were authoring/co-authoring ten articles in professional journals, supervising other psychologists and psychology interns, and chairing the Organizing Committee of Psychologists Interested in the Study of Psychoanalysis.

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Experiences with Empathy and Listening Skills   oooooooo

During my psychotherapeutic interactions with clients ranging from mildly dysfunctional to severely disturbed, I witnessed the power of using empathy and listening skills to:
  • foster good relationships with them
  • calm them
  • facilitate their "opening up" to me.

I have given talks and workshops on how the use of empathy, listening skills, and acknowledgments contributes to emotional intimacy, good relationships, happy marriages, and psychological hugs.

NOTE: Reading the table of contents will help you understand the following links, which appear on every page of this website:

HOME CONTENTS WARNING INTRODUCTION 1. EMP. ACK. 2. PSYCH. HUG 3. BENEFITS I
4. BENEFITS II 5. URGE TO HELP 6. URGE TO TALK 7. BASIC SKILLS 8. EXPLN. SKILLS 9. DIFFICULTIES
10. ESSNL. ACK. 11. WHEN ACK. NOTES ADDNL. READING APPRECIATIONS AUTHOR

If you liked this site, e-mailing me your thanks will reward me for creating it and help sustain my motivation to keep it going for future visitors.

My Other Websites on Empathy and Listening Skills

Empathy, Listening Skills, and Relationships is a short version of this website.

Listening Skills and Relationships is a discussion board which includes messages from me and my responses to messages from others. To read or post messages, you do not have to register. Visit the board to read questions and answers, ask or answer questions, share experiences, etc.

Empathy contains a description of a conversation with a United States Copyright Office representative during which I used empathy.

Listening Skills contains a description of listening to my wife talk about her grocery shopping trips.

Communication Skills illustrates my use of nonverbal "listening skills" during a conversation to assess whether the other person is receiving my message.

Listening Skills Professional explains why I advocate that society establish the profession of empathic listener as a profession separate and independent from that of psychotherapist.

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Copyright © 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005 by Lawrence J. Bookbinder, Ph.D.