YES FOR ME YAWNING IS VERY CONTAGIOUS IN FACT YOUR QUESTION HAS MADE ME FEEL LIKE YAWNING.
HERE IS A FEW THINGS I FOUND ON YAWNING I WILL BET YOU TEN POINTS YOU CANNOT READ MY ENTIRE ANSWER WITHOUT YAWNING YOU ARE GETTING SLEEPY VERY SLEEPY FOR SOME REASON AS I READ THIS JUST CAN'T STOP YAWNING.
A yawn (synonyms chasma, pandiculation, oscitation from the Latin verb oscitare, to open the mouth wide[1]) is a reflex of deep inhalation and exhalation associated with being tired, with a need to sleep, or from lack of stimulation. Pandiculation is the term for the act of stretching and yawning. Yawning is a powerful non-verbal message with several possible meanings, depending on the circumstances. It is also claimed to help increase the state of alertness of a person. It could possibly be from lack of oxygen. Another speculated reason for yawning is nervousness - paratroopers were once noted yawning right before their first jump, and had just come from a coffee break. The exact causes of yawning are still unascertained.
Contents [hide]
1 Origin of the word
2 Hypothesized causes of yawning
3 Contagiousness
4 Trivia
5 Superstitions
6 Notes and references
7 External links
[edit] Origin of the word
The word "yawn" has evolved from the Middle English word yanen, an alteration of yonen or yenen, which in turn comes from the Old English geonian.
[edit] Hypothesized causes of yawning
An indication of tiredness, stress, over-work, lack of directed attention or boredom.
An action indicating psychological decompression after a state of high alert.
A means of expressing powerful emotions like anger, apathy, apprehension, remorse or tedium.
A cat yawningA previous long-standing hypothesis is that yawning is caused by an excess of carbon dioxide and lack of oxygen in the blood. The brain stem detects this and triggers the yawn reflex. The mouth stretches wide and the lungs inhale deeply, bringing oxygen into the lungs and hence to the bloodstream. It is almost certain, however, that this hypothesis is incorrect. One study has documented that this effect does not exist.[2]
A more recent hypothesis is that yawning is used for regulation of body temperature. Another hypothesis is that yawns are caused by the same chemicals (neurotransmitters) in the brain that affect emotions, mood, appetite and other phenomena. These chemicals include serotonin, dopamine, glutamic acid and nitric oxide. As more of these compounds are activated in the brain, the frequency of yawning increases. Conversely, a greater presence in the brain of opiate neurotransmitters such as endorphins reduces the frequency of yawning. Patients taking the serotonin reuptake inhibitor Paxil (Paroxetine HCl) or Citalopram, another SSRI, have been observed yawning abnormally often.
Another theory is that yawning is similar to stretching. Stretching, like yawning, increases blood pressure and heart rate while also flexing many muscles and joints. It is also theorized that yawning helps redistribute surfactant, an oil-like substance which coats the lungs and aids breathing. Some have observed that if one tries to stifle or prevent a yawn by clenching one's jaws shut, the yawn is unsatisfying. As such, the stretching of jaw and face muscles seems to be necessary for a satisfactory yawn.
Yet another theory is that yawning occurs to stabilize pressure on either side of the ear drums. The deep intake of air can sometimes cause a popping sound that only the yawner can hear; this is the pressure on the inner ear stabilizing. This commonly occurs in environments where pressure is changing relatively rapidly, such as inside an airplane and when travelling up and down hills, which cause the eardrums to be bent instead of flat.
Some movements in psychotherapy such as Re-evaluation Counseling or co-counselling believe that yawning, along with laughter and crying, are means of "discharging" painful emotion, and therefore can be encouraged in order to promote physical and emotional healing.
[edit] Contagiousness
The yawn reflex is often described as contagious: if one person yawns, this will cause another person to "sympathetically" yawn.[3] Mythbusters attempted an experiment documenting this effect in episode 2.28, "Is Yawning Contagious?", with a conclusion of partly confirmed. The proximate cause for contagious yawning may lie with mirror neurons, i.e. neurons in the frontal cortex of certain vertebrates, which upon being exposed to a stimulus from conspecific (same species) and occasionally interspecific organisms, activates the same regions in the brain[4]. Mirror neurons have been proposed as a driving force for imitation which lies at the root of much human learning, e.g. language acquisition. Yawning may be an offshoot of the same imitative impulse.
At a distal level (in terms of evolutionary advantage), yawning might be a herd instinct.[5] Other theories suggest that the yawn serves to synchronize mood behavior among gregarious animals, similar to the howling of the wolf pack. It signals tiredness to other members of the group in order to synchronize sleeping patterns and periods of activity. It can serve as a warning in displaying large, canine teeth. This phenomenon has been observed among various primates. The threat gesture is a way of maintaining order in the primates' social structure. The contagion of yawning is interspecific, for example a human yawning in front of a pet dog can incite the dog to yawn as well. Oddly, sometimes sympathetic yawning may be caused by simply looking at a picture of a person or animal yawning, or even seeing the word yawn.[citation needed] A specific study was conducted on chimpanzees. A group of chimpanzees was shown a video of other chimpanzees yawning, and the study chimpanzees yawned also. This helps to partly confirm a yawn's "contagiousness".
[edit] Trivia
Adelie Penguins employ yawning as part of their courtship ritual. Penguin couples face off and the males engage in what is described as an "ecstatic display," their beaks open wide and their faces pointed skyward. This trait has also been seen among Emperor Penguins. Researchers have been attempting to discover why these two different species share this trait, despite not sharing a habitat.[citation needed]
In about 5% of patients, the antidepressant drug Clomipramine can cause inadvertent orgasms when yawning.[6]
In captivity, the Leopard Gecko has been observed "yawning". Whether this is akin to human yawning has not been confirmed.
Superstitions
superstitions surround the act of yawning. The most common of these is the belief that it is necessary to cover one's mouth when one is yawning in order to prevent one's soul from escaping the body. The Ancient Greeks believed that yawning was not a sign of boredom, but that a person's soul was trying to escape from its body, so that it may rest with the gods in the skies. This belief was also shared by the Maya.[citation needed]
Other superstitions include:
A yawn is a sign that danger is near.
Counting a person's teeth robs them of one year of life for every tooth counted. This is why some people cover their mouths when they laugh, smile, or yawn.
If two persons are seen to yawn one after the other, it is said that the one who yawned last bears no malice towards the one who yawned first.
If you don't cover your mouth while yawning, then the devil will come and rob your soul (Estonia).
In some Latin American, east Asian and Central African countries yawning is said to be caused by someone else talking about you.
A yawn may be a sign that one is afflicted by the evil eye (Greece).
These superstitions may not only have arisen to prevent people from committing the faux pas of yawning loudly in another's presence — one of Mason Cooley's aphorisms is "A yawn is more disconcerting than a contradiction" — but may also have arisen from concerns over public health. Polydore Vergil (c. 1470-1555), in his De Rerum Inventoribus, writes that it was customary to make the sign of the cross over one's mouth, since "alike deadly plague was sometime in yawning, wherefore men used to fence themselves with the sign of the cross...which custom we retain at this day."[7]
Others hold the superstition that when a person yawns, someone just walked over that person's future grave site or the future grave site of his or her children.
[edit] Notes and references
^ A. Price Heusner. YAWNING AND ASSOCIATED PHENOMENA. Physiological Review 1946: 25; 156-168. Online pdf-version
^ "Yawning" by Robert R. Provine, pages 532-539, American Scientist, November-December 2005, Vol 93, No. 6 [1]
^ The website by Émilie attempts to prove this.
^ V.S. Ramachandran, Mirror Neurons and imitation learning as the driving force behind "the great leap forward" in human evolution. Retrieved on 2006-11-16.
^ Schürmann et al. Yearning to yawn: the neural basis of contagious yawning. NeuroImage 24 (4), 1260–1264 (2005). PMID 15670705. (see also Platek et al. (2005). Contagious Yawning and The Brain. Cognitive Brain Research, 23(2-3):448-52. PMID: 15820652)
^ "Yin, Yang and Yawn" - Snopes article on Clomipramine
^ Iona Opie and Moira Tatem, A Dictionary of Superstitions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992),
Next time you're in a meeting, try this little experiment: Take a big yawn, cover your mouth out of courtesy, and watch and see how many people yawn. There's a good chance that you'll set off a chain reaction of yawns. Before you finish reading this question of the day, it's likely that you will yawn at least once. Don't misunderstand, we aren't intending to bore you, but just reading about yawning will make you yawn, just as seeing or hearing someone else yawn makes us yawn.
Interesting Yawning Facts
The average yawn lasts about six seconds.
Your heart rate can rise as much as 30 percent during a yawn.
55 percent of people will yawn within five minutes of seeing someone else yawn.
Blind people yawn more after hearing an audio tape of people yawning.
Reading about yawning will make you yawn.
Olympic athletes often yawn before competition.
What's behind this mysterious epidemic of yawning? First, let's look at what a yawn is. Yawning is an involuntary action that causes us to open our mouths wide and breathe in deeply. We know it's involuntary because we do it even before we are born. Research shows that 11-week-old fetuses yawn.
There are many parts of the body that are in action when you yawn. First, your mouth opens and jaw drops, allowing as much air to be taken in as possible. When you inhale, the air taken in is filling your lungs. Your abdominal muscles flex and your diaphragm is pushed down. The air you breath in expands the lungs to capacity and then some of the air is blown back out.
While the dictionary tells us that yawning is caused by being fatigued, drowsy or bored, scientists are discovering that there is more to yawning than what most people think. Not much is known about why we yawn or if it serves any useful function, and very little research has been done on the subject. However, there are several theories about why we yawn. Here are the three most common theories:
The Physiological Theory -- Our bodies induce yawning to drawn in more oxygen or remove a build-up of carbon dioxide. This theory helps explain why we yawn in groups. Larger groups produce more carbon dioxide, which means our bodies would act to draw in more oxygen and get rid of the excess carbon dioxide. However, if our bodies make us yawn to drawn in needed oxygen, wouldn't we yawn during exercise? Robert Provine, a psychologist at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and a leading expert on yawning, has tested this theory. Giving people additional oxygen didn't decrease yawning and decreasing the amount of carbon dioxide in a subject's environment also didn't prevent yawning.
The Evolution Theory -- Some think that yawning is something that began with our ancestors, who used yawning to show their teeth and intimidate others. An offshoot of this theory is the idea that yawning developed from early man as a signal for us to change activities.
The Boredom Theory -- In the dictionary, yawning is said to be caused by boredom, fatigue or drowsiness. Although we do tend to yawn when bored or tired, this theory doesn't explain why Olympic athletes yawn right before they compete in their event. It's doubtful that they are bored with the world watching them.
The simple truth is that even though humans have been yawning for possibly as long as they have existed, we have no clue as to why we do it. Maybe it serves some healthful purpose. It does cause us to draw in more air and our hearts to race faster than normal, but so does exercise. There's still much we don't understand about our own brains, so maybe yawning is triggered by some area of the brain we have yet to discover. We do know that yawning is not limited to man. Cats, dogs, even fish yawn, which leads us back to the idea that yawning is some form of communication.
Have we provoked a yawn out of you yet? If we have, hopefully it's not out of boredom, but by the power of suggestion.
Here are some interesting links:
How Sleep Works
How Your Lungs Work
How Laughter Works
Why can't you tickle yourself?
What causes snoring and can anything be done about it?
What is it about caffeine that keeps you awake?
MSNBC: Why Do We Yawn?
Why do we yawn and why are yawns contagious?
Why is yawning contagious?
HealthLink: Yawning
Yawning is catching in chimps
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Why is yawning contagious?
Brain study deepens mystery
March 5, 2005
Special to World Science
It may not be one of life’s deepest mysteries, but as scientific conundrums go, it has a peculiar staying power. Why is yawning contagious?
Fox
Sea Lion
Different animals, same yawn. (Credits: Road Safety Council of Western Australia, Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife; NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)
Click here for an online movie of a chimpanzee yawning in reaction to a video of another one yawning. (From Biology Letters, December 2004 online issue)
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Researchers recently found that yawning isn’t only catching among people; it is also among chimpanzees. (Click here for a brief video from this research.) No one has devised a fully convincing explanation of why.
Compounding the mystery is the odd way in which the contagious power of yawning is largely unconscious. We can see someone yawn, yearn to replicate the action ourselves, and do it, all without thinking about it. Other times we’re aware it is happening, though it still floats somewhere beneath the realm of reason and of purposeful actions.
So what gives? In an effort to find the answer, the Finnish government recently funded a brain scanning study. The results turned up some hard-to-interpret, possible clues. It also confirmed the obvious: yawn contagion is largely unconscious. Wherever it might affect the brain, it bypasses the known brain circuitry for consciously analyzing and mimicking other people’s actions.
This circuitry is called the “mirror-neuron system,” because it contains a special type of brain cells, or neurons, that become active both when their owner does something, and when he or she senses someone else doing the same thing.
Mirror neurons typically become active when a person consciously imitates an action of someone else, a process associated with learning. But they seem to play no role in yawn contagiousness, the researchers in the new study found. The cells are have no extra activity during contagious yawning compared with during other non-contagious facial movements, they observed.
Brain activity “associated with viewing another person yawn seems to circumvent the essential parts of the MNS [mirror neuron system], in line with the nature of contagious yawns as automatically released behavioural acts—rather than truly imitated motor patterns that would require detailed action understanding,” wrote the researchers, with the Helsinki University of Technology and the Research Centre Jülich, Germany. The findings are published in the February issue of the research journal Neuroimage.
But if seeing someone yawn doesn’t activate these centers, what does it do to the brain? The researchers found that it appears to strongly activate at least one brain area, called the superior temporal sulcus. But this activation was unrelated to any desire to yawn in response, so it may be irrelevant to the contagion question, the researchers added.
Possibly more significant, they wrote, was the apparent deactivation of a second brain area, called the left periamygdalar region. The more strongly a participant reported wanting to yawn in response to another person’s yawn, the stronger was this deactivation.
“This finding represents the first known neurophysiological signature of perceived yawn contagiousness,” the researchers wrote.
Exactly what the finding means is less clear, they acknowledged. The periamygdalar region is a zone that lies alongside the amygdala, an almond-shaped structure deep in the brain in the area of the side of the head. The periamygdalar region has been linked to the unconscious analysis of emotional expressions in faces. Why it would be deactivated in tandem with yawn contagion is unclear, the researchers said.
One thing seems clear from the study is that “contagious yawning does not rely on brain mechanisms of action understanding,” wrote one of the researchers, Riitta Hari of the Helsinki University of Technology, in a recent email. Rather, she continued, it seems to be an “‘automatically’ released (and most likely very archaic) motor pattern,” or sequence of physical actions.
In the study, volunteers looked at videos of actors yawning or making other mouth movements. Meanwhile their brains were scanned using functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging, a system that shows the amount of activity or work going on in various brain areas based on the amount of oxygen being used up there. The volunteers were later asked how strongly they had been tempted to yawn while viewing the pictures.
Apart from the physical brain mechanisms of yawn contagiousness, researchers have offered different reasons as to why it exists. Some have proposed that in early humans, yawn contagiousness might have helped people communicate their alertness levels to each other, and thus coordinate their sleep schedules.
This might be part of a more general phenomenon of unconscious signals that serve to synchronize group behavior, the authors of the Neuroimage paper wrote. “Such synchronization could be essential for species survival and works without action understanding, like when a flock of birds rises to the air as soon as the first bird does so—supposably as it notices a predator.”
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