What is yawning?

Does yawn have a purpose? I know that means you are sleepy, but does the body want to accomplish something with the act of yawning?

People yawn when they are tired, but also when they wake up after sleeping all night. We gag when we are bored, but also when we are anxious, hungry or about to start a new activity. Yawning is contagious. We usually start yawning when someone near us does it.

"There are a lot of detonators, people who practice skydiving say they yawn before jumping into the camp.The police say they yawn before getting into a difficult situation," Adrian said. Guggisberg, professor of clinical neuroscience at the University of Geneva.

Reading about yawning makes people yawn: maybe you're yawning now.

However, the physiological goal of yawning remains a mystery. "Until now, the most sincere answer is that we do not know why we are gagging," Guggisberg said. "To date, no physiological effect of yawning has been observed, and for this reason, we speculate, it is possible that yawning has no real physiological effect."

About thirty years ago, scientists explained yawning as a reaction to oxygen deprivation, through which we could inject a large amount of air into the body to increase the oxygen level. in the blood. However, the hypothesis of oxygenation was ruled out after a series of experiments published in 1987 that disproved it.

According to one current theory, yawning is a brain cooling mechanism "that helps promote the state of alertness," according to Andrew Gallup, an badociate professor of psychology at the Polytechnic Institute of the University of Toronto. State of New York. published studies on the subject.

Yawning is a deep inhalation of air accompanied by a powerful stretching of the jaw, followed by a shorter expiration and a quick closing of the jaw.

"Together, these models increase the blood flow that goes in the direction of the skull, which can have several effects, one of which is brain cooling," Gallup explained. "When our body temperature is high, we feel tired and sleepy, and night yawning may be activated to resist the initial feeling of sleep, so we yawn at night to stay alert or watch."

Sleep activates a pronounced reduction in brain and body temperature, Gallup explained. It is therefore also possible that "we only slap to facilitate the transition from the previous day to lethargy".

One thing is certain: yawning is contagious. The yawn of a person can make a whole group react in reaction. It is believed that the yawning of others influences the most empathic people more easily; Studies using brain scans have shown that when humans observe other people yawning, areas of the brain involved in social functions are activated. Even dogs yawn when they see their human owners or strangers, and contagious yawning has also been observed in other animals.

The spread of yawning could be aimed at "promoting coordinated surveillance among group members by synchronizing their mental state, so that they can protect themselves by alerting themselves to outside threats more quickly than under other conditions" he suggested. Gallup.