What appears to be significant for this study is that more respondents report that the capacities are strictly innate than those who report that they are strictly learned. In some cases, as with cooperation and relationships, twice as many people believe that the capacity is innate, while with empathy and forgiveness four to five times as many people believe that the capacity is innate. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the capacities are innate, but it may show that some peacemakers find behaviors related to the capacities to be an integral part of how their clients function. Empathy in particular shows up in the data as one capacity worthy of much closer examination. The data shows a very large proportion of the respondents believe that empathy is an innate human capacity. This is consistent with the literature review and points to the empathy capacity as one that could be predictable.
The heavy weight placed on the learned and predominantly learned answers of all the capacities, but especially cooperation and relationships, works both for and against the idea that these are common capabilities. For example, Chart 1 shows that understanding the reciprocal nature of relationships is found to be common by 91.3% of the peacemakers while at the same time, most of the same peacemakers believe that the capability is learned. While this may mean that humans all have the ability as a core capacity, and it may be nurtured to a point of being useful, it may also mean that the capability is only learned and that we may find people that have no concept of the behavior if the study were to be expanded. The answers may also reflect the “book learning” of the respondents rather than the actual make-up of their clients. This perception among peacemakers may open up an entirely new area to be studied, rich in ideas about what we as peacemakers bring to the table.
