The basic empathy scale: A French validation of a measure of empathy in youth

The aim of our study was to validate a French version of the basic empathy scale (BES Jolliffe and Farrington (2006)) which measures both cognitive and affective empathy with a sample of 446 adolescents. The confirmatory factorial analysis showed that the French scale has the same factorial structure as in the original version with two-factors (cognitive and affective empathy). The BES exhibited satisfactory internal, test–retest and discriminant validity. Moreover, the females’ superiority in empathy was replicated. So, the BES is one of the first empathy scales to be made available in French and possesses good psychometric qualities.