JAKARTA - Have you ever evaporated after seeing other people yawn? Or just hear the sound of people yawning, then suddenly evaporate too? This phenomenon is known as contagious yawning or infectious yawning. Most interestingly, this not only happens to humans, but also to some animals.
According to Dr. Charles Sweet, a certified psychiatrist and medical adviser at Linear Health, this is related to the work of brain cells called mirror neurons or mirror neurons.
"When you see someone yawning, the neurons are immediately active," Sweet said in an email, quoted from the Live Science page.
These neurons respond to actions observed in others, and may be the reason why yawning is easy to spread within social groups.
Research also shows that it is more likely for us to evaporate when we see people we know evaporate, compared to foreigners. In a 2013 study, for example, dogs evaporated more often when they saw their owners evaporate rather than seeing unknown people. This phenomenon is called familiarity, commonly biased towards individuals who are familiar.
Individuals are naturally paying more attention to people in their social circle, "explained Andrew Gallup, professor of behavioral biology at Johns Hopkins University.
One theory says infectious yawning evolves as a mechanism for increasing threat detection in clusters. In a 2007 study published in Evolutionary Psychology, Gallup and his team found yawning helps cool the brain. This cooling is believed to increase awareness and efficiency of mental processing.
"If yawning spreads inside the group, it may raise awareness of the surrounding threats," Gallup wrote.
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Recent Gallup research shows that just by seeing other people evaporate, a person's ability to recognize threats can increase. This reinforces the allegation that infectious yawning has an important role in increasing collective vigilance.
However, not all researchers agree that yawning is contagious solely about threat detection. Another theory says infectious yawning develops to synchronize behavior in groups.
Yawning often marks a shift in activity and follows a natural circadidian rhythm. By spreading yawning, group members can be biologically aligned and behaviorally.
"Infectious bribes may serve to align patterns of activity within the group," Gallup said.
The theory is reinforced by studies in wild African lions (Panthera leo). In observations of 19 lions from two social groups, researchers found that infected lions evaporated from other lions, 11 times more likely to mimic the first evaporating lion movement, compared to lions that did not evaporate.
Even so, not everyone is prone to infectious yawning. In controlled studies, only about 40% to 60% of participants evaporated after seeing a person's video evaporate.
Then, does this have anything to do with empathy? Some studies are trying to find a connection, but the results are still diverse.
"Some studies found a relationship that was in line with predictions, but others didn't," said Gallup.
Previous research showed that autistic children tend to be less contagious towards yawning than nonutistic children.
However, when they were given instructions to focus on people who evaporated, the difference disappeared. This suggests that attention also plays a major role in this phenomenon.
One of the most consistent findings in research on infectious yawning is related to psychopathy.
Individuals who score high in psychopathic characteristics tend not to be vulnerable to infectious yawning, Gallup said.
This psychopathic trait includes pulsation, manipulation, and failure. In the end, yawning that is contagious is not just a matter of drowsiness.
"This is a way to secretly align with people and sometimes pets." said Dr. Sweet.
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