55 out of 100 people will yawn within 5 minutes of witnessing someone else yawning! Moreover, a blind man will yawn when he hears someone else yawning. Even reading about yawning will make you yearn to open your mouth and exhale. Talk about being extremely contagious!
Yawning becomes contagious at around the age of four – but why is it such a powerful feeling? Interestingly, yawning being contagious is not just amongst humans – the behavior also exists in chimpanzees and dogs! Scientists believe that this behavioral characteristic in humans is a holdover from a period in evolutionary history. In simpler words, if Darwin’s theory was true, then this is a social characteristic men inherited from the monkey.
Yawning also initiates a form of social bonding. If one yawns, many others follow, perhaps a signal to the group that it’s time to sleep. Or, if someone yawns if they are bored, many others follow, then perhaps its time to change the topic of conversation.
What stimulates the brain such that we yawn unconsciously, i.e. because we have just seen someone else do it? The brain circuitry has been analyzed, and scientists have found out that the brain has a “mirror-neuron system” which contains a special brain cell or neuron, called “mirror neurons”. These become active when a person is to unconsciously imitate an action of someone else, and stimulate the brain to perform that action. So if you yawned reading this article, you know it’s your mirror-neutron in action
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