My friend Mahfuz,

The ancient Greeks (particularly the early Plato) considered passions diseases and advocated rationality to control them. Twentieth-century philosophers like Croce deemed them acts of will constituting an essential part of the person, and he advocated developing them and letting them run their course. Hence, unless we think of them as a disease-- which we need not--, it may not be precise to speak of them as "contagious." Perhaps more exact would be to call them "communicable." Artworks chiefly concerned with exciting particular emotions (for instance, Beethoven´s "Ode to Joy" or Tchaikovsky´s "Symphonie Pathetique") aim to arouse joy or sadness in entire audiences. There is nothing to prove, however, that one affect is more communicable that another, and I know of no research that has ever made that claim.

Dear Mahfuz

There are sad and happy people, but that does not mean that happy people do not feel sadness or that sad people don't feel happiness . All energies are contagious, both good and bad!

I think sadness could be more contagious than happiness in certain situations. If environmental situations are hard for more people, sadness of anyone could trigger in others more sadness. but if the life is going easy, sadness of persons should not trigger others to be sad. the opposite is true for happiness. to conclude environmental conditions could play a triggering role.

My friend Mahfuz,

The ancient Greeks (particularly the early Plato) considered passions diseases and advocated rationality to control them. Twentieth-century philosophers like Croce deemed them acts of will constituting an essential part of the person, and he advocated developing them and letting them run their course. Hence, unless we think of them as a disease-- which we need not--, it may not be precise to speak of them as "contagious." Perhaps more exact would be to call them "communicable." Artworks chiefly concerned with exciting particular emotions (for instance, Beethoven´s "Ode to Joy" or Tchaikovsky´s "Symphonie Pathetique") aim to arouse joy or sadness in entire audiences. There is nothing to prove, however, that one affect is more communicable that another, and I know of no research that has ever made that claim.

Dear Cecilia,

You put your finger on something very important: emotions are often conditioned by culture. Romanticism in all cultural spheres wallowed in gloom. The European early 1920s cultivated non-sentimental, joyous enthusiasm. We can either accept the emotional Zeitgeist or stay impervious to it because of our own personal temperament.

Dear Mahfuz,

Very interesting question. When a person is happy everybody feels happy for him/her. However when one is sad, obviously everyone will try to lessen the sadness by showing empathy towards him/her. That is a natural feeling and really helps the people to come out of sadness as fast as possible. I think it is desirable.

Agree with Cecilia, we tend to protect or pacify sad people more than share happiness of happy people because maybe sad ones need more support and empathy. It is human tendency to run for the help of the sad ones. If both situations arise at the same time, I wonder what one will do? I will myself first console the sad one and then congratulate the happy one.

Do you think that is inhuman, considering the situation?

Dear all,

Value should be used as the basic principle is that those who give thanks for favors granted, then it will grow and favors whoever is not grateful, then it can not be perceived favors anymore.

Anyway favors what else would we deny.

Sadness is worthy of grief because we were thankful that we have to earn.

Thank surely we will be happy, stay away from sadness surely will not be more grateful. Grieving will only bring us to the brink of misery.

I think sadness is more contagious than happiness among majority of the populations in the world. But let we smile all together, do not too much thinking about simple things, take our life easy, make our life more beautiful and then we will be happy. TQ

Dear Mahfuz, I think happines and sadness have the same level of potential contagious. Much depends on personal sensitivity one's for both qualities. Some people perceive and define situaltions their are involved as dramas, other as comedies or comedy-dramas.on the similar basis.

Both happiness and sadness are conveniently essential qualities of human beings who come down from heaven to earth.

I would say that happiness are less contagious than sadness. But it is once again depend on the type of person how they handle it. For instance: Happiness after passing an exam may remain shorter than the sadness after failing the exam. One group of person may enjoy the pass exam result as long as possible while the other group may take the failing as lession for new way of preparation.

Both emotional states contaminate the subject in greater or lesser intensity due to the mechanism of sympathy and empathy . But I add the compathy ; emotional contagion so intense it causes physiological changes and even disorders like pain, vomiting , sleep disturbance or blackout . An English nurse researcher (Janice Morse) presents the three mechanisms: sympathy / empathy / compathy .

But this emotional contagion (happiness and sadness) depends on the dominant psychological profile of the subject ; predominantly sad profile are more susceptible to contagion by sadness, and the person who most often experience feelings of happiness will identify and empathize more with happiness.

Other factors such as the emotional state of the moment or have experienced life event also influences the contagion of happiness or sadness .

Dear Mahfuz,both are emotions which actually depend on personality type and absorption level of individuals.Both are equally contagious,though its been observed that bad news travel faster than good news.its more mystical than emotional ,philosophical,or psychological.Now by extrapolation,if bad news travel faster,that means sadnesses might also be working on peoples mind more than happiness.Again a happy person seem to be at peace with his/her environment and might leave the environment as peaceful as it is,But a sad person tends to offset and upset things.that is why sadness seems more contagious.this is my thinking,not based on any empirically proof just observations.

Again,when you share good news,you find out that the audience may not show overt empathy(shouting,laughing,clapping etc) then share a sad news,by the time you end it ,the whole audience atmosphere changes ,many more people shout,cry,hiss,make faces etc,so i think sadnesses emits more emotions,so more contagious than happiness.from observations Sir

Dear Mahfuz,

We must distinguish between feelings and emotions. The first is largely "intellectual" and the second "primary"...Their expression involves cultural and environmental dimensions: we are sad at funeral and happy at a wedding. Drug use can reinforce feelings, emotions and their expression gathering people around.

A French author Marcel Pagnol speaks of "Families suicides"...don't we could describe "Families sad or happy" ? The strength of collective learning with the help of time to do so, if the rules of society allows expression...The contagion may be possible.

Best regard.

Jean.

Nothing deserves to be sad keep happy all the time.

Need to keep yourself happy. If sad, it may be good to think of happy moments to feel more positive about things.

Hi happiness is not contagious but a blessing for positive thinking,if you thnk in a constructive way ,you will be happy and it not contagious.

I agree completely with Nelson!

Remember, René Descartes:

"often a false joy is preferable to sadness whose cause is true"...this is probably why people prefer the announcement of good news and opt for despot those promise the best...And if contagion of hope is more likely than misfortune... that make us consider the role of conditioning ?

Best regards.

Jean.

I don't think that happiness is less contagious than sadness.

Close friends and relatives always shares happiness and sadness equally.

Regards,

Nitish

Happy can spread. I find on numerous occaisons when I am immersed in my work in office and then I hear laughter from my colleagues then I feel like smiling. It also allows me to pause and think whether I should take a short break or do something more effectively.

I hope and I really think that happiness is more contagious than sadness...but:

"il y a dans l'homme un désir de néant profondément installé et surtout dans la

masse des hommes, une sorte d'impatience amoureuse, à peu près inaccessible, unaniforme, pour la mort", Céline.

And wether to ditinguish the individual man of the society of men ?

Regards.

Jean;

I see not many difference between happiness and sadness, they turn into each other and feed each other.

It is also true that people get happy from sad tunes and get sad by hearing good news from others.

This chemistry depends also from country to country. Italian people are making me mostly happy.

Hi,

I think that someone is happy and enter a place smiling and talking nicely, all those presence could infected with the happiness he/she inspired in the place.

Is envy stronger than pity??

To measure we need first of all a unit.

To evaluate why not use a visual analogical scale or a digital scale ?

I think any time that this self-assessment mode would introduce a bias in affective traits of the person that would increase or decrease the score.

Jean.

Dear Mahfuz:

Interesting topic.

I have found this interesting article.

Lorenzo Coviello, Yunkyu Sohn, Adam D.I. Kramer, Cameron Marlow, Massimo Franceschetti, Nicholas A. Christakis, James H. Fowler.

Detecting Emotional Contagion in Massive Social Networks.

PLOS/one published March 12, 2014.

Sincerely.

Diana from Perú.

Based on our own research I would say that most people regard themselves as more susceptible to catching others happiness than their sadness. However, in experimental studies the differences are not that obvious. For instance, faces, voices or music expressing sadness seems to be just as contagious as those expressing happiness.