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Sadness

For the video game, see Sadness (video game).


"Sad" redirects here. For other uses, see Sad (disambiguation) and SAD (disambiguation).

A detail of the 1672 sculpture Entombment of Christ, showing Mary Magdalene crying

Sadness is an emotional pain associated with, or characterized by, feelings of disadvantage,


loss, despair, grief, helplessness, disappointment and sorrow. An individual experiencing
sadness may become quiet or lethargic, and withdraw themselves from others. An example of
severe sadness is depression, a mood which can be brought on by major depressive
disorder or persistent depressive disorder. Crying can be an indication of sadness.[1]
Sadness is one of the "six basic emotions" described by Paul Ekman, along
with happiness, anger, surprise, fear, and disgust.[2]:271–4
Contents

Childhood

Sad girls. Photo by Paolo Monti, 1953

Sadness is a common experience in childhood. Some families may have a (conscious or


unconscious) rule that sadness is "not allowed",[3] but Robin Skynner has suggested that this
may cause problems, arguing that with sadness "screened off", people can become shallow
and manic.[4]:33; 36 Pediatrician T. Berry Brazelton suggests that acknowledging sadness can
make it easier for families to address more serious emotional problems.[5]:46; 48
Sadness is part of the normal process of the child separating from an early symbiosis with the
mother and becoming more independent. Every time a child separates a little more, he or she
will have to cope with a small loss. If the mother cannot allow the minor distress involved,
the child may never learn how to deal with sadness by themselves.[4]:158–9 Brazelton argues
that too much cheering a child up devalues the emotion of sadness for them;[5]:52 and Selma
Fraiberg suggests that it is important to respect a child's right to experience a loss fully and
deeply.[6]
Margaret Mahler also saw the ability to feel sadness as an emotional achievement, as opposed
for example to warding it off through restless hyperactivity.[7] D. W. Winnicott similarly saw
in sad crying the psychological root of valuable musical experiences in later life.[8]
Neuroanatomy
According to the American Journal of Psychiatry, sadness has been found to be associated
with "increases in bilateral activity within the vicinity of the middle and posterior temporal
cortex, lateral cerebellum, cerebellar vermis, midbrain, putamen, and caudate."[9] Jose V.
Pardo has his M.D and Ph.D and leads a research program in cognitive neuroscience. Using
positron emission tomography (PET) Pardo and his colleagues were able to provoke sadness
among seven normal men and women by asking them to think about sad things. They
observed increased brain activity in the bilateral inferior and orbitofrontal cortex.[10] In a
study that induced sadness in subjects by showing emotional film clips, the feeling was
correlated with significant increases in regional brain activity, especially in the prefrontal
cortex, in the region called Brodmann's area 9, and the thalamus. A significant increase in
activity was also observed in the bilateral anterior temporal structures.[11]
Coping mechanisms
Main article: Coping (psychology)

A man expressing sadness with his head in his hands

People deal with sadness in different ways, and it is an important emotion because it helps to
motivate people to deal with their situation. Some coping mechanisms include: getting social
support and/or spending time with a pet,[12] creating a list, or engaging in some activity to
express sadness.[13] Some individuals, when feeling sad, may exclude themselves from a
social setting, so as to take the time to recover from the feeling.
While being one of the moods people most want to shake, sadness can sometimes be
perpetuated by the very coping strategies chosen, such as ruminating, "drowning one's
sorrows", or permanently isolating oneself.[2]:69–70 As alternative ways of coping with
sadness to the above, cognitive behavioral therapysuggests instead either challenging one's
negative thoughts, or scheduling some positive event as a distraction.[2]:72
Being attentive to, and patient with, one's sadness may also be a way for people to learn
through solitude;[14] while emotional support to help people stay with their sadness can be
further helpful.[4]:164 Such an approach is fueled by the underlying belief that loss (when felt
wholeheartedly) can lead to a new sense of aliveness, and to a re-engagement with the outside
world.[15]
Pupil empathy
Pupil size may be an indicator of sadness. A sad facial expression with small pupils is judged
to be more intensely sad as the pupil size decreases.[16] A person's own pupil size
also mirrors this and becomes smaller when viewing sad faces with small pupils. No parallel
effect exists when people look at neutral, happy or angry expressions.[16] The greater degree
to which a person's pupils mirror another predicts a person's greater score
on empathy.[17] However, in disorders such as autism and psychopathy facial expressions that
represent sadness may be subtle, which may show a need for a more non-linguistic situation
to affect their level of empathy.[17]
Vocal patterns
According to Swati Johar, sadness is an emotion "identified by current speech dialogue and
processing systems".[18]:12 Root mean square(RMS) energy, inter-word silence and speaking
rate were noted as useful measurements in distinguishing sadness from other emotions.[19]It's
communicated mostly by lowering the variability of the fundamental frequency.[20] Johar
argues that, "when someone is sad, slow, low pitched speech with weak high audio
frequency energy is produced". Likewise, "low energy state of sadness attributes to slow
tempo, lower speech rate and mean pitch".[18]:10; 13
Sadness is, as stated by Klaus Scherer, one of the "best-recognized emotions in the [human]
voice", although it's "generally somewhat lower than that of facial expression". In a study by
Scherer, it was found that in Western countries sadness had 79% of accuracy for facial
recognition and 71% for vocal, while in Non-Western countries the results were of 74% and
58%, respectively.[21]

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