The Contagious Yawn

Is yawning really contagious? When you see someone yawn, do you yawn too? Have you ever thought about the conditions in which you yawn? For example, do you tend to yawn more when you’re tired, when you’re around those who are close to you, or do you yawn any time you see someone else yawn no matter what? Contagious yawning is an interesting thing to think about. For most people, they think if they see someone yawning, they will yawn too within seconds later. However, behaviors show that we can’t catch a yawn from just anyone. Yawning happens more commonly between people who are close to us. We tend to catch the yawns of family members and friends, and the yawns of strangers don’t always phase us.

The reason that we may yawn after someone we are close to yawns, is because yawning and empathy have been shown to be linked together. Empathy is having the ability to being able to relate to another’s feelings and emotions. Studies have shown this in humans and other animals such as the chimpanzee. Researchers have presented videos of yawning chimpanzees and also chimpanzees who aren’t yawning to humans. After the videos, they focused on the humans’ yawning responses, the context of relationships, and compared the responses of males and females. Researchers had found that the gender of the yawning individual in the video played a big role in its responsive yawners. The studies show that high amounts of males had yawned when they saw other males yawning, and there were low amounts of males yawning when females yawned as well as low amounts of females yawning when they saw either gender yawning.

Another study has found that dogs were able to catch yawns from their owners, which also shows that yawning is in fact an empathy-based response. Research in the study shows that when dogs heard the sound of a human yawn instead of actually seeing the yawn, it made yawning seem more contagious in the dogs. The study used family and friends that the dogs recognized as well as including strangers in the experiment. Findings had shown that the dogs were prone to yawn more when they heard familiar yawns than when they heard unfamiliar yawns, which is a good study that proves that yawning can be contagious between those who are close to us.

However, not all yawns are contagious ones, but those that are contagious usually are started from seeing or hearing a yawn first. Just like many have probably heard before, research has indicated that yawning may be caused due to a temperature change of the brain. For example, when our body temperature begins to fall, we start to feel tired, which causes us to yawn. While I was researching this topic of “contagious yawning” and writing this blog, I must say that I myself couldn't stop yawning after reading about it and thinking about the concept of yawning. I believe that is proof to show that yawning is contagious. I bet if you aren’t yawning yet, you might be very shortly after thinking about whether or not yawning is contagious.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/12/111212092649.htm

http://sciencefriday.com/blogs/07/17/2012/the-contagious-nature-of-yawning.html?audience=2&series=2