Am I Normal?
Am I Normal for Crying a Lot?
Humans are the only species that cries emotional tears. Here's how often everyone else does it.
Crying is a universal human behavior with documented health benefits — it releases oxytocin and endorphins, reduces cortisol, and activates the parasympathetic nervous system. Whether you cry daily or once a year, here's how the data stacks up.
Do I cry too much or too little?
See exactly how your crying frequency compares to population averages by gender and age.
🧠 Mental Health — Check your percentile →How well do you regulate your emotions?
Crying is an emotional regulation mechanism — not a sign of poor regulation.
🎯 Self-Regulation — Check your percentile →Are you a Highly Sensitive Person?
15-20% of people are Highly Sensitive Persons (HSPs) who cry more easily. It is a neurological trait.
🧿 Psychology — Check your percentile →Am I depressed?
Sudden changes in crying patterns — more or less — can signal depression. Screen yourself here.
🧠 Mental Health — Check your percentile →How Often Do People Actually Cry?
The most cited data comes from Dr. Ad Vingerhoets' research at Tilburg University, the world's leading expert on crying. His studies across 37 countries found that women cry an average of 30-64 times per year (roughly 2.5-5 times per month), while men cry 6-17 times per year (roughly 0.5-1.4 times per month). The average across genders is 1-3 times per month.
These numbers have a wide standard deviation. Some people cry several times a week and are psychologically healthy. Others cry once a year and are also fine. Frequency alone is not diagnostic.
The Gender Crying Gap
Before puberty, boys and girls cry at similar rates. The gap emerges around age 13, driven primarily by testosterone (which inhibits crying) and prolactin (which facilitates it). Women have 60% more prolactin than men. This is biology, not weakness.
Cultural norms amplify the gap. In countries with greater gender equality (e.g., Sweden, Netherlands), men cry more frequently than in countries with rigid masculinity norms. The "real men don't cry" narrative is cultural, not biological.
When Crying Is a Concern
Crying becomes clinically relevant when it represents a sudden change from your baseline, not when it exceeds some arbitrary threshold. If you rarely cried and now cry daily, or if you used to cry regularly and suddenly feel nothing, that shift may warrant a depression screening (PHQ-9).
Pseudobulbar affect (PBA) — uncontrollable crying or laughing unrelated to mood — affects about 2 million Americans and is neurological, not psychological. If your crying feels involuntary and disconnected from your emotions, mention PBA to your doctor.
The Benefits of Crying
Emotional tears contain stress hormones (ACTH) and natural painkillers (leucine-enkephalin) that basal and reflex tears do not. Crying literally flushes stress chemicals from your body. A 2014 study in Frontiers in Psychology found that 88.8% of people feel better after crying, particularly when they received social support during or after.