This study examined the effects of similar experience on three measures of empathy: empathic concern, empathic accuracy and perceived empathy. Women who had never been mothers, were pregnant with their first child, or had just given birth to their first child (20 in each group) served as perceivers, watching and responding to videotapes of new mother targets (N = 20). When perceivers had closer experience to the targets, they expressed greater empathic concern for targets and targets reported perceiving greater empathy when they saw the perceivers' responses. However, experience had no effect on empathic accuracy. Additional analyses indicated that greater disclosure is related to greater perceived empathy and perceivers who were new mothers projected their own experiences on to targets.