Human beings are probably the only creatures with a capacity to shed emotional tears. While prior work has mostly used data-driven approaches to identify situational antecedents of adult crying, we present a theory-based taxonomy. Assuming that crying is preceded by the frustration or satisfaction of psychological needs, we postulate that the most common antecedents of crying can be organized into five categories—that is, the Five Reasons to Cry (FRC): loneliness, impotence, overload, harmony, and media. Testing our assumptions in a retrospective study (N = 720, pre-registered) and a thirty-day electronic diary study (N = 91) showed that (i) crying episodes could be reliably assigned to the FRC, (ii) the theorized relations to frustrated/satisfied psychological needs emerged, and (iii) the categories were systematically related to subjective well-being, indicating their criterion validity. In sum, this research provides a valid taxonomy of common situational antecedents of adult emotional crying.

人类可能是唯一能够流下情感眼泪的生物。虽然之前的工作主要使用数据驱动的方法来识别成人哭泣的情境前因，但我们提出了一种基于理论的分类法。假设哭泣之前是心理需求的挫败或满足，我们假设最常见的哭泣前因可以分为五类，即哭泣的五个原因（FRC）：孤独、阳痿、超负荷、和谐、和媒体。在一项回顾性研究（N = 720，预先注册）和一项为期 30 天的电子日记研究（N = 91）中测试我们的假设表明（i）哭泣事件可以可靠地分配给 FRC，（ii）理论化的关系出现沮丧/满足的心理需求，(iii) 这些类别与主观幸福感系统地相关，表明它们的标准有效性。总之，这项研究提供了成人情绪哭泣的常见情境前因的有效分类。