Descriptive norms—expectations about others’ actions—reliably and powerfully predict one’s own behavior, ranging from pro-environmental actions to voter turnout. What has been less studied, however, is how norms impact a process that can be argued to precede such benevolent behaviors and is integral to human prosociality: empathically sharing in and experiencing another’s emotions. In two MTurk studies that used a novel behavioral choice paradigm, the Empathy Selection Task, we directly manipulated task-specific information about the extent to which others chose to engage with empathy for presented targets, over repeated instances. As predicted, in Study 1 (N=195 participants), participants in the high-empathy norm condition were more likely to choose empathy (46.80% of the time) compared to participants in the low-empathy norm condition (32.58% of the time). Study 2 (N=196) replicated these findings, with participants in the high-empathy norm condition favoring empathy (48.12%) compared to participants in the low-empathy norm condition (32.03%). Across conditions, participants were more likely to choose empathy when they believed others chose empathy, and despite perceiving empathy as more effortful compared to the alternative course of action. These results point to the potentially powerful role that norms play in the interpersonal regulation of empathy. Eliana Hadjiandreou, B.A. Graduate Student Penn State University Personal <http://elianahadjiandreou.com/> | Lab <https://sites.psu.edu/emplab/> | LinkedIn<https://www.linkedin.com/in/eliana-hadjiandreou-24426961/>