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So far it’s been a tear-jerker of a week in the news, not least because of the tragic demise of pop queen Whitney Houston, whose untimely death sparked an outpouring of grief from fans around the world. Then another singer, British solo artist and queen of tear-jerkers Adele, won big at the Grammys, with prizes for best record, song and album of the year. Adele, as you know, is famous for belting her heart out over the agonies of being dumped, which is apparently a fate worse than death.

Her latest album sold 1.5 million copies in the first nine weeks of its release, and the song “Someone Like You” has become impossible to escape. The tune plays everywhere — on television, on the radio, as you wander around the mall and finally in your brain, where it clings to your memory like chewing gum so that despite yourself, you find yourself singing it in the shower and humming it in your sleep.

Adele’s songs about heartbreak and bad relationships have succeeded in reducing her listeners to tears and sending them into sudden attacks of despair and self-pity. Unlike other soppy love songs, they give voice to those feelings that would otherwise remain unspoken. Adele is like the modern-day troubadour, the morose and rejected lover who finds solace in her lyrics and ignites the same emotions in her listeners, inspiring them to head straight to the karaoke parlor and unleash their passions.

The sob-factor of “Someone Like You” is so potent that The Wall Street Journal tried to explain it in scientific terms. In an article called “Anatomy of a Tear-Jerker,” reporter Michaeleen Doucleff explains that the music contains the right ingredients to send particular signals to the brain that can produce strong emotions.

“Combined with heartfelt lyrics and a powerhouse voice, these structures can send reward signals to our brains that rival any other pleasure,” Doucleff writes.

The key ingredient is the “appoggiatura,” an ornamental note that clashes with the melody just enough to create a dissonant sound. “This generates tension in the listener,” Martin Guhn, a psychologist at the University of British Columbia who co-wrote a 2007 study on the subject, told Doucleff. “When the notes return to the anticipated melody, the tension resolves, and it feels good.”

“Someone Like You” is filled with these appoggiaturas, as the music’s emotional intensity releases the feel-good chemical dopamine in our brains and leaves us craving more.

At least now I understand why my friends go gaga over the song — and why they find it practically offensive that I remain completely unmoved by it all.

It’s actually a mystery to me, too. Why, rather than entering the realm of sentimental bliss, complete with chills, sweaty palms and a quick heartbeat, do I feel somewhat cold when I hear Adele’s songs? My response is especially confusing since scientific research shows that her music should resonate with our sympathetic nervous systems, producing a response that has made Adele the most popular singer of the moment, even matching Madonna at the height of her career.

Since science, record sales and artistic achievement have all proven that there’s nothing wrong with Adele’s music, the fault must lie in my own head.

Perhaps I have the romantic sensibility of a Finn, which is practically nonexistent according to my Finnish friend. When Finns get married and exchange vows, they don’t promise to stay in love until “death do us part, ”but rather “until things change, and then I will let you know,” or something to that effect. But then in a country where 50 percent of marriages end in divorce, it’s probably better to err on the side of cautious optimism rather than plunging headlong into the fickle arms of blind Cupid, only to find yourself getting dumped or disappointed.

Or maybe it’s my broken genes. A new study published in the journal Science on Thursday reveals that the average person goes through life with 20 of their 20,000 genes broken, or inactive. An article in The Washington Post explains that although these expendable genes do not control critical functions for survival, we often don’t know how we will be affected without them.

In the article, Daniel G. MacArthur of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in England, who led the study, expressed his reaction to the finding: “That we can actually have 20 genes knocked out and still be walking around without suffering any ill effects — that was surprising.”

Perhaps in my case there is an ill effect: an inability to respond appropriately to the appoggiaturas in Adele’s music.

Desi Anwar is a senior anchor at Metro TV. She can be contacted at desianwar.com and dailyavocado.net.