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Asked by readlwh to David, Helen, Ian, rhysphillips, Sarah on 14 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by 07gillardjen.
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Rhys Phillips answered on 14 Jun 2011:
Your eyes watering can be to clean them out – e.g. when dust gets into them. But crying can also be triggered by chemicals released into the brain when you are sad.
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Ian van der Linde answered on 14 Jun 2011:
This is a difficult question to answer. It is likely to be a quirk of evolution that ended up being “socially useful”. When we are upset and cry it draws attention to the fact that we are upset, so it is a way of showing people that we need support and comfort. It is very difficult to “fake” cry in a convincing way, so it also lets people know that we are geniunely upset rather than just saying we are upset because people could lie about that. A lot of the time, the way we communicate with one another is not verbal (i.e., not using words) and crying is just another example of non-verbal communication, just like facial expressions, laughing, posture and pheremones (chemical signals that we can pick up subconsciously with our noses).
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