Chart why women cry

In the words of one man:. Elsbach was surprised, given the involuntary nature of crying, that crying in the office was so often seen as manipulative. She did, however, take note of a few differences. Men, she says, were uniformly perceived more positively than women. Men, meanwhile, were already thought to be strong and unemotional. In each story, the researchers changed the gender of the main character, whether the person felt angry or sad, and whether the protagonist began to fully cry or simply teared up.

Men who teared up were viewed more positively than any of the other groups—either gender of full-on criers or women who teared up. It made little difference whether the women cried or teared up. The man who cries in a controlled, thoughtful way, and for a good reason—think Russell Crowe in Gladiator, she writes—is a real man with a soft side. Women get no such benefit. Before puberty, the serum prolactin levels are the same in both sexes, and studies have found that the crying level of boys and girls is much more similar before puberty.

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Shields and Warner believe that a shift has taken place since the s, when studies showed that society judged men's tears to be inappropriate. Today, both men's and women's tears are deemed most acceptable in extreme situations, such as the death of a loved one or a relationship break-up which the person is perceived to have no control over, as opposed to situations deemed less severe, such as a computer crash.

In their study, Warner and Shields found that, in serious situations, tears were viewed positively regardless of the crier's gender, race or the emotional motivation anger or sadness behind the tears. Of course, there are many levels of crying, from slightly moist eyes to all-out bawling. And how you cry does make a difference. A moist eye is a signal of strong emotion under control, and Warner and Shields found that both men and women were looked at more positively when they teared up than when they cried.