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Showing posts with label crying. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crying. Show all posts

Is There a Science to the Perfect Ugly-Cry Face?



Here is a piece I did for MTV.com on what indicates sincere crying, and why we cry when other people cry, even when we are watching an actor cry on screen!.

Crying is often cathartic. It's an emotional release triggered by a range of feelings — sadness, love, anger, and grief, to name a few. So when you're watching a scene from a television show or movie that makes you feel things, it's a totally normal response. So normal, in fact, that there's an entire MTV Movie & TV Awards category dedicated to things that make us cry.

But not all cries are created equal.

Why is it that when MTV Best Actor nominee Mandy Moore sheds a tear on This Is Us, audiences feel empathy, while Kim Kardashian's tears are meme-ified for the internet's entertainment? Even Claire Danes and her Emmy-winning cry faces have been the butt of internet jokes.



It's not that Danes is exaggerating her sobs for the camera; in fact, it's more likely that she is just extremely good at her job, specifically the crying part of it.
"She gets that sad face, and it kind of lingers and then it fades out, but it's very slow," body-language expert and speaker Patti Wood told MTV News. "That's one of the reasons we're affected by it so profoundly, because most of the time real crying doesn't disappear. True crying lingers and comes and goes in waves."

When we see someone cry onscreen, the mirror neurons in our brains fire, which elicits a very primal response from us — one that mimics what we're seeing. Isopraxism, or the pull to the same energy, is also in effect. "Isopraxism in nature explains why birds fly together and deer run together and why people applaud," Wood said. "That's another thing that's part of what's going on when people see and hear people crying on the screen."



Of course seeing someone cry doesn't always elicit the same response. As Dr. Meredith Grey on Grey's Anatomy, Tearjerker nominee Ellen Pompeo is one of television's most seasoned criers — and also one of the most effective. According to Ad Vingerhoets, the world's foremost expert on crying, how the person cries is an important determinant of how audiences will respond to a character's tears.

Wood says: "In sadness, the inner corners of the eyebrows go up, the eyelids droop, the corners of your mouth go down, and sometimes there's this weird change in the cheeks, like the cheek muscles go toward the nose. In agony, you're pulling your facial muscles in a lot toward the center and downward. That combination is exactly the opposite of what you might find attractive.

"Typically, the facial muscles are balanced and … lifted up, so the eyebrows go up all the way and the eyelids don't droop, they stand up straight; the corners of the mouth go up and the cheeks go up, so you get this upward balanced expression," she added. "In crying, specifically in agony, you get this mixture of up and down, but a lot of down."



To audiences, that downward movement might not be the most aesthetically pleasing. "To us, it might look ugly, and ugly is unpleasant," Wood said.

And when viewers feel unpleasant or uncomfortable, laughing is often a go-to stress response. "We're fighting against the emotion — in this case, sadness — to laugh," she explained.

The relationship the audience has with the crier is also important. For a public persona like Kardashian, some people might feel apathetic toward her emotions, and for an actress like Danes, it might be that her portrayal of pure, unfiltered agony is just too real for some audiences to feel any empathy. Hence her heavily memed facial contortions.


Link to actual article:  http://www.mtv.com/news/3009170/ugly-cry-face-science/


Patti Wood, MA - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com.
     

Why 'I'm So Happy I Could Cry Makes Sense


Why We Cry When We are Happy and May smile When We Are Very Sad.

As a family we often watch an emotional TV recording of my brother-in-law coming home from the Gulf War. As he gets off the plane, my sister and the children are running towards him crying, not looking happy at all. Have you ever seen someone cry when they are happy or have a smile on their face when they are sad?  New research shows people use “negative” emotion to stabilize their feeling. The research study is below. I am fascinated by this nonverbal behavior. I love to see happy crying. It is such a sincere, amazing behavior to witness. On the other hand, I find it deeply disturbing when I analyze interrogation videos or courtroom footage of suspected murders for the media and I see them give what I call a “cover smile” when they relay some of the most hideous aspects of the crime. In this case the suspect is trying to regulate the emotions of guilt by smiling to look innocent and it feels disturbing to us to watch. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141111124047.htm
November 11, 2014
Yale University
The phrase 'tears of joy' never made much sense to one American psychologist. But after conducting a series of studies of such seemingly incongruous expressions, she now understands better why people cry when they are happy.
he phrase "tears of joy" never made much sense to Yale psychologist Oriana Aragon. But after conducting a series of studies of such seemingly incongruous expressions, she now understands better why people cry when they are happy.
Related Articles


*       Psychologist
*       Social cognition
*       Happiness
*       Lateral thinking
*       Left-handed
"People may be restoring emotional equilibrium with these expressions," said Aragon, lead author of work to be published in the journal Psychological Science. "They seem to take place when people are overwhelmed with strong positive emotions, and people who do this seem to recover better from those strong emotions."
There are many examples of responding to a positive experience with a negative emotion. A crying spouse is reunited with a soldier returning from war. Teen girls scream at a Justin Bieber concert and so do soccer players as they score a winning goal. The baseball player who hits a winning home run is pounded at home plate by teammates. And when introduced to babies "too cute for words," some can't resist pinching their cheeks.
"I was surprised no one ever asked why that is," she said.
Aragon and her colleagues at Yale ran subjects through some of these scenarios and measured their responses to cute babies or happy reunions. They found that individuals who express negative reactions to positive news were able to moderate intense emotions more quickly. They also found people who are most likely to cry at their child's graduation are most likely to want to pinch a cute baby's cheeks.
There is also some evidence that strong negative feelings may provoke positive expressions; for example nervous laughter appears when people are confronted with a difficult or frightening situations, and smiles have been found by other psychologists to occur during extreme sadness.
These new discoveries begin to explain common things that many people do but don't even understand themselves, Aragon said.
"These insights advance our understanding of how people express and control their emotions, which is importantly related to mental and physical health, the quality of relationships with others, and even how well people work together," she said.


Story Source:
The above story is based on materials provided by Yale University. The original article was written by Bill Hathaway. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


Journal Reference:
1.     E. J. Boothby, M. S. Clark, J. A. Bargh. Shared Experiences Are Amplified. Psychological Science, 2014; DOI: 10.1177/0956797614551162


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Yale University. "Why 'I'm so happy I could cry' makes sense." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 11 November 2014.


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Was Jodi Arias Really Crying?


Check the link below to hear Patti's insights during the Nancy Grace Show and the In Session segment on the body language of Jodi Arias on the witness stand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GORILG9LVYY&feature=youtu.be

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at www.PattiWood.net. Check out Patti's website for her new book "SNAP, Making the Most of First Impressions, Body Language and Charisma" at www.snapfirstimpressions.com. Also check out Patti's YouTube channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Life Lesson Quote for March 30, 2012

Cry with someone.  It's more healing than crying alone.

Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://PattiWood.net. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Dr. Conrad Murray Tearing Up at His Manslaughter Case...The Big Debate at OK Magazine



This week we're asking experts their thoughts on crying at a trial, based on
Dr. Conrad Murray tearing up at his manslaughter trial in connection with
the death of Michael Jackson. (He cried when witnesses testified that he was
a good doctor who helped the poor.)

http://www.scribd.com/doc/74575580/Dr-Conrad-Murray

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/conrad-murray-cries-during-jackson-trial/2011/10/26/gIQAiuelJM_video.html

As I have watched the video of the trial I find it interesting that many people are calling his overall demeanor through the trial stone faced. I have noticed that he often has the downward pockets of sadness beneath his eyes and cheeks and at times combined with that sadness the raised eyelids and brows of fear with the white showing above his pupils. In this one minute clip he is crying on the tape. It was the most heartfelt, spreading to his whole face, when the witness talked about his father. The timing of that along with his ability to look at the witness, just furtive glances as she talked, shows not only grief about his father and a bit of sadness, but embarrassment that he didn't live up to his father. The Kleenex rubbing on his face - where he is using the Kleenex only on the side of his face towards the witness also indicates an embarrassment with what the witness is saying. Interesting that he is sad when she is saying he was her doctor. Is it because he didn't do his all for her and the other clinic patients or has he fallen so low compared with his dad's legacy?


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://pattiwood.net/. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.

Patti Reads the Body Language of Casey Anthony on the Dr. Drew Show

Find out my latest body language reads that I shared with Dr. Drew yesterday after viewing tapes of Casey Anthony in the courtroom during the murder trial of her 2 year old daughter, Caylee. I also revealed some insights on Casey's mother, Robin, as she took the stand to testify. Check the link below to view my YouTube channel.
http://www.youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert#p/u/0/FlPEka0XOds


Patti Wood, MA, Certified Speaking Professional - The Body Language Expert. For more body language insights go to her website at http://pattiwood.net/. Also check out the body language quiz on her YouTube Channel at http://youtube.com/user/bodylanguageexpert.