Why do we yawn cavemen

Yawning is a mystery, so we decided to find out more about it. If nothing else, to learn how to stop those involuntary yawns that happen when we're meant to be paying attention, like in work meetings, when listening to a friend, or in the middle of a long lecture. If you've ever found yourself wondering why you're yawning when you aren't tired, or when you're actually paying attention, read on for our research-based explanation. A yawn is an involuntary motion that involves us opening our mouth widely, taking in a bunch of air, and then exhaling.

The entire process takes an average of about 6 seconds. Theories abound ranging from a lack of oxygen in the brain to sheer boredom. As your brain transitions to different times of day or activities, it may induce a yawn. At night, we become less alert, and that can encourage a yawn.

If you find yourself doing it at inopportune times during the day, your body may be trying to wake you up. This is because all that brain activity raises its temperature, and opening your mouth widely while inhaling and exhaling air cools it down. When you open up your mouth widely, you increase blood flow and circulate fluid faster. Weird, but it works. Crazy, right? Instead, we used a variety of signals to communicate, and yawning was one of them. In our early days on this planet, this is how we communicated that we were tired or bored, and that behavior seems to have persisted at some level.

It turns out there is some truth to the lack of oxygen theory, as scientists have discovered that yawning occurs more frequently when our blood needs an oxygen boost. Again, the faster heartbeat induced by a yawn comes into play here, and it pushes more oxygen through our system. Professor Steven Platek blows this theory out of the water, saying that there is no correlation between yawning and an increase of oxygen in the bloodstream. After all, babies yawn in utero, before their lungs have even been ventilated for the first time.

It is therefore clear that what spurs us to yawn is not something that happens in the body but rather something that happens in the brain. Low oxygen levels in the paraventricular nucleus the PVN in the hypothalamus causes yawning. So while it is not true that yawning is a way to supply our bodies with more oxygen, it may very well be that it serves to supply our brains with more oxygen.

The most convincing theory at the moment belongs to Psychology Professor Andrew Gallup, who holds that yawning is a thermoregulatory mechanism. In other words, that we yawn in order to regulate our temperature. I have always wondered why this happens, and so I did my research and got down to the bottom of it. Here are 4 reasons why we yawn when we see someone else doing so as well:.

According to numerous studies, the science behind contagious yawning boils down to one main reason—empathy. If someone flashes you a nice smile, you would automatically do the same right? Same goes for yawning! The delay between yawn and response was greater between acquaintances and strangers, again suggesting that empathy and social familiarity played a role.

The researchers wrote: "Our results demonstrate that yawn contagion is primarily driven by the emotional closeness between individuals and not by other variables, such as gender and nationality. Dr Catriona Morrison, an experimental psychologist from the University of Leeds, said that this primitive subconscious response could shed light on the evolution of the human brain.

She said: "Some have suggested that it developed from the days of cavemen when someone had to be on watch all the time - yawning increases cerebral blood flow so can improve alertness. Dr Atsushi Senju, from Birkbeck College in London, said that a similar effect had been noted in a type of baboon, with contagious yawning more likely between close allies in a troupe.