Seeing Through Tears by Judith Kay Nelson

When women cry, their weeping even turns into full-blown sobbing in 65 percent of cases, compared to just six percent of cases for men. Other research from the German Society of Ophthalmology, which had collated different scientific studies on the why women cry, suggests that women cry, on average, between 30 and 64 times a year (and cry for around six minutes each time) meanwhile, men cry just six to 17 times through the year (and cry for only about two to four minutes each time).

Newer research from Lauren Bylsma, PhD, of the University of Pittsburgh (published in the Journal of Research in Personality in 2011) reflects similar results. He found that, on average, women cry 5.3 times per month, while men only cry 1.3 times per month. When we're caught off guard when a coworker bursts into tears, it makes us almost innately uncomfortable.īut why do we cry so much (and women especially), and how can we work on stopping ourselves from it when we feel like crying at work - or how can we handle it when we just can't fight the tears? Why Do Women Cry So Much?īiochemist William Frey, PhD looked into why women cry so much back in the 1980s. Ultimately, crying at work violates what anthropologists call 'display rules,' which refer to our cultural norms for self-expression and socialization. Recent research suggests that crying can be okay, so long as women adhere to aforementioned social scripts - the preconceived notions of what their supervisors and colleagues expect from them. It's taboo because women risk being labeled emotion, weak, unprofessional or even manipulative, which can ruin their careers. And, yet, crying at work is still so taboo. Whether they slink off to the bathroom to tell themselves to get it together or just break down at their desks, professional adults cry all the time. Either way, you're not alone.Ī wealth of research suggests that tons of people cry (a lot), even at work. Have you ever gotten choked up in the workplace but tried to hold back your tears so as to avoid crying at work in front of your coworkers? Perhaps you just let it out.

Seeing Through Tears by Judith Kay Nelson