Empathy Assignment

When I took the empathy quiz, my quotient was 46. This number rates about average. The website said most women hit around 47. I believe I'm quite average in my empathy rating; however, I thought this number would be much higher. I thought I was a little more empathetic than average.
I do believe you can be taught empathy, but as Oprah and Daniel Pink said, it's a spectrum. You can teach a child or someone to be more empathetic but they can only learn up to a certain degree of your spectrum. There is a person in my family who is the model of emapthy. She is constantly doing things to help people out. She can easily sense how you're feeling and how to help out in a situation. However, on the opposite of the spectrum, I used to have a friend that was the antonym of empathy. He was rude and inconsiderate. He would never go out of his way to help a person, especially if the cost affected him negatively. I once told him my grandmother was very sick and he replied with a simple, "Again?" I believe that is the polar opposite of empathy.
Overall, I believe empathy is a very important quality to have, and even more so in the career field I'm aiming for. If I wish to become a succcessful pediatrician, I must be able to relate to patients and families properly.