Music

Here's the scientific reason behind Bieber Fever

by Mark Teo

If you hate Justin Bieber—and you certainly wouldn’t be the only one, as he’s wanted man in Argentina—you might be wondering how he built his cult: His hometown of Statford, after all, developed a Bieber map to lure tourists. Even if he was arrested for drunk driving and drag racing, he has legions of fans who follow him, blubbering over his every move. So, what gives? Where does Bieber fever come from—and why do fans cry every time they see him?

Researchers at Yale sought to find the answers—and they did. People cry when the see Justin Bieber, they found, for the same reasons they pinch the cheeks of cute babies. Or laugh when they hear bad news. Beliebers cry—which is an action which overwhelmingly is associated with sadness—to balance out the rush of euphoria they feel when they hear “Baby.”

“People may be restoring emotional equilibrium with these expressions,” Yale psychologist Oriana Aragon told the Daily Mail. “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.”

That explains tears of joy—the same tears people cried for the Beatles, or New Kids on the Block, or Backstreet Boys, or One Direction. They cry to balance out the extreme happiness they’re feeling. And there’s a function to the crying: The team at Yale found that people who cried when experiencing intense happiness—so, Beliebers—were better able to regulate their emotions.

In other words, maybe we should all be crying when we experience extreme emotions.

“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,” says Aragon.

On the flipside, sometimes, we use laughter to balance strong negative emotions. To wit: Who didn’t chuckle when they heard that Biebs pissed in a bucket? Or when he egged a neighbour? If you laughed at those news items, you may be regulating your disgust.