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Why Do We Cry? The Art of Shedding Tears
Charles Darwin once declared emotional tears purposeless, and nearly 150 years later, emotional crying remains one of the human body’s more confounding mysteries.
Everybody cries sometimes, and if you don’t, perhaps you should. Humans are emotional beings, what we do is dictated by a whole range of emotion. Every one of us has probably shed tears of sadness, pain, grief, frustration but also tears of joy, ecstasy, empathy, gratitude. Tears are produced whenever emotions are strongly felt, the good emotions and the bad ones, but why do we cry, and does it help us?
Why Do We Have Tears When We Cry?
There are fundamentally 3 types of tears:
- Basal tears are a protein-rich antibacterial liquid that helps to keep the eyes moist each time a person blinks.
- Reflex tears are triggered by irritants such as wind, smoke, dust. They are released to flush out these irritants and protect the eye.
- Emotional tears are a response to a range of emotions.
Basal and reflex tears are essential to help you see clearly and maintain the health of your eyes, but what about emotional tears, and are humans the only species that produce emotional tears?
