The Empathy Crisis

What happens when we feel everything and nothing--all at once?

In an age where pain becomes content and compassion competes with clout, empathy isn't extinct, it's eroded. The Empathy Crisis explores how we got here. From the endless scroll of outrage to the quiet burnout of digital life, we've grown fluent in tragedy but hesitant with tenderness. Blending psychology, media studies, and personal narrative, this book uncovers how our emotional reflexes have been rewired, and how to get them back.

For anyone who's felt numb, disconnected, or unsure how to care again, this is your call to feel on purpose.

Social media has fundamentally reshaped how we connect, consume, and care. But beneath the constant scrolling, sharing, and reacting lies a quieter crisis: we're becoming emotionally numb.

From viral tragedies to performative outrage, today's digital culture rewards detachment, spectacle, and speed--leaving little room for depth, reflection, or genuine empathy. The Empathy Crisis explores how this shift has altered our inner world, distorting how we feel, relate, and respond to others. Through a blend of psychology, media analysis, and cultural critique, this book debunks common myths about empathy and offers insight into how digital consumption is reshaping our emotional lives. More importantly, it guides readers toward reclaiming the sensitivity we've learned to suppress--online and off.

Objectives

1. Redefine Desensitization: Disrupt the narrative that emotional numbness is simply the result of "too much screen time," and instead reveal the deeper psychological, cultural, and historical forces that shaped our detachment.
2. Illuminate the Research: Ground the conversation in evidence--from neuroscience and media psychology to trauma theory and cognitive science--showing how modern life is rewiring our emotional reflexes.
3. Expose the Invisible: Help readers recognize the everyday ways in which social media, memes, comment sections, and curated personas subtly shift our empathy--without us even realizing it.
4. Empower the Reader: Provide actionable strategies to move from emotional avoidance to embodied empathy. Whether through reflection, digital boundaries, or rewiring our responses, readers will walk away with tools to feel again, with purpose and integrity.

Author: Corey Emanuel
Publisher: Prometheus Books
Published: 10/06/2026
Pages: 142
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.29lbs
Size: 7.00h x 5.00w x 0.34d
ISBN: 9781493096022


Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 08/24/2026
Library Journal 09/01/2026 pg. 126

About the Author
Dr. Corey Emanuel is a media psychologist, thought leader, and 2024 TEDx speaker. After graduating with a master's degree in communication from Columbia University in New York City, he earned a PhD in Media Psychology from Fielding University in Santa Barbara, California.

Dr. Corey has been featured as a guest expert on the nationally syndicated Tamron Hall Show, KTLA News, ABC Morning News as well as in Black Enterprise Magazine. In 2012, he published his first children's book entitled, Can I Be President, Too?, inspired by the 44th President, Barack Obama. Dr. Corey is a proud board member of the National Association of Black Journalists Los Angeles (NABJLA). He is also an instructor at FYI-Films which teaches filmmaking to incarcerated teens. Dr. Corey is the host of the digital series, Lend Me Your Lens, and the resident host of the podcast series, Tough Talks, serving helpful tips to parents and guardians having to navigate taboo conversations with their maturing children. Dr. Corey is the founder of the social movement, Men Talking Shift which is dedicated to helping men develop healthier relationships and navigate mental health challenges. He is also a consultant for the Rodney King Foundation which exists to end police brutality and promote social justice as well as the Alliance of Leadership and Innovation for Exposed Victims (A.L.I.V.E.) which exists to combat human trafficking in the Black community. Dr. Corey is passionately dedicated to using multimedia and psychology to educate, inform, and inspire diverse audiences across the globe. He enjoys guest lecturing, traveling, cooking, and being a mixologist to family and friends. Dr. Corey is based in Los Angeles, California.