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If you cry with happiness at weddings you are responding to a happy experience with a negative reaction, researchers claim.

And they believe the unusual reaction may help restore emotional equilibrium in us and keep intense emotions under control.

Experts say that their work helps to shed light on how people express and control their emotions, which could help advance their understanding of people's mental health.

People who cry at weddings (illustrated with a stock image) are responding to a happy experience with a negative reaction, and this response may help restore emotional equilibrium in us, scientists claim

Oriana Aragon, the Yale psychologist who led the study, set out to explore the phrase 'tears of joy,' which she said never made sense to her.

But after conducting a series of studies into seemingly incongruous expressions, she now understands better why people cry when they are happy.

'People may be restoring emotional equilibrium with these expressions,' she explained.

'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.'

The report, which is published in the journal Psychological Science, cites various examples of responding to a positive experience with a negative emotion, such as: a crying spouse being reunited with a soldier returning from war and teenage girls scream at a Justin Bieber concert.

The study cites various examples of responding to a positive experience with a negative emotion, such as a crying spouse being reunited with a soldier returning from war, and when people can't help pinching babies' cheeks (stock image) who they consider cute

Examples also include a baseball player who hits a home run, only to be slapped on the back by teammates and when people can't help pinching babies' cheeks who they consider cute.

Dr Aragon and her colleagues ran study participants through some of these scenarios and measured their responses to cute babies or happy reunions.

They discovered that individuals who express negative reactions to positive news were able to moderate intense emotions more quickly.

They found that 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.

The study revealed that individuals who express negative reactions to positive news - shown here by a happy woman crying after voting in the first election since former President Mohamed Morsi was ousted in Egypt - were able to moderate intense emotions more quickly

For example, nervous laughter often occurs when people are confronted with a difficult or frightening situations, and psychologists have seen people smiling during times of extreme sadness.

These new discoveries begin to explain common things that many people do but don't even understand themselves, Dr 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.