• Question: Why do our eyes water when we are sad... How do our emotions create physical reactions?

    Asked by Steph29 to John, Laura, Luke, Rob, Ruth on 20 Jun 2016.
    • Photo: Laura Finney

      Laura Finney answered on 20 Jun 2016:

      Tears are really interesting as they aren’t just water! When we are sad it causes us pain and your tears are thought you contain a natural pain killer!
      It’s also a way of communicating that isn’t verbal so people know you are sad and you do not have to say anything. This is useful for babies for example who cannot communicate to you using words but you know instantly that something is happening to them that they don’t like.

      Other tears like those when you cut onions are simply to clean your eyes from the chemical that comes from the onion.

      This is a great article about tears that you might want to read

      http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/why-do-we-cry-the-science-of-tears-9741287.html

    • Photo: Robert Williams

      Robert Williams answered on 20 Jun 2016:

      This is an emotional response.
      Emotions have wide-ranging effects on the body and the pathway to create an emotional response involves most parts of the nervous system.
      It is possible that the human body has evolved emotions to express non-verbal communications – happiness, sadness, anger, euphoria, despair etc. all have different effects on our bodies and often affect more than one organ – such as the skin, eyes, heart, liver etc.

    • Photo: Ruth Patchett

      Ruth Patchett answered on 21 Jun 2016:

      Well Laura’s answer is great for crying! I learnt a lot from that.
      Other physical responses are a useful product of evolution too, for example when we are afraid our body releases adrenaline, this helps to prepare us to run away or fight what we are afraid of, so you will notice when you are afraid your heart rate quickens preparing us for exercise (like running away), our breathing also gets quicker, our blood gets more directed to our muscles for the same reason. It’s less handy if we are afraid of something that we actually don’t need to run away from (for example I am afraid of slugs but my bodies response isn’t too helpful).

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