Are social skill and empathy separable constructs? A psychometric evaluation of a new role-play assessment of empathy for individuals with schizophrenia

The present study evaluated the psychometric properties of a role-play measure of empathy, the Performance of Empathic Expression Rating Scale (PEERS), in a sample of 60 individuals with schizophrenia and 51 healthy controls. The role-play ratings assess a person's ability to interact empathically with a confederate in an emotionally charged situation. The PEERS demonstrated acceptable internal consistency and inter-rater reliability. Construct validity was assessed through analyses of variance to examine differences between patients and controls. Patients performed significantly worse than controls, but most of these differences were explained by social skill ability. Convergent validity analyses indicated that the PEERS is related to some aspects of a self-report measure of empathy and a theory of mind task. The PEERS also demonstrated acceptable discriminant validity. Implications for the future use of this measure will be discussed.