Researchers at American University of Beirut Target Brain Death (Empathy in a Brain-Death Nursing Practice Narrative from Lebanon: Folk-Psychological, Phenomenological, and Cognitive Science Perspectives).

This article focuses on research from the American University of Beirut examining empathy in nursing practice related to brain death cases. It explores how folk psychology—a theory of social cognition involving beliefs, desires, and intentions—intersects with phenomenology, social ontology, and neuroscience to explain nurses’ learning and empathetic engagement in clinical settings. Using a case study of an ICU nurse, the research highlights the role of embodied social cognition, affective resonance, and mirror-neuron mechanisms in developing empathy, sympathy, and compassionate care. The study integrates Edith Stein’s phenomenology of empathy and relational ethics within contemporary social cognition theories to inform nursing practice in brain death contexts. [Extracted from the article]