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Human yawning is contagious ... even in dogs

2020-02-16T15:53:48.232Z


Scientists have observed and sought to understand why man's most loyal friend yawns when humans do too.


Experiment: yawn casually and you will see that there is a good chance that it will cause other yawning around you. Well, this amazing mechanism does not only work between humans but also with dogs. This is shown by a very serious study published in the last issue of the British review "Proceedings of Royal Society B".

In humans, this well-known reflex is triggered more easily under certain conditions, especially if the person we are imitating is someone who is familiar to us. Also observed in man's best friend, contagious yawning has so far been seen as a potential sign of animal empathy towards its owner.

Alas, it is not, says the team at the University of Sciences in Auckland (New Zealand) which has addressed this funny question. Your favorite Labrador could very well do the same with a complete stranger. To reach this conclusion, the researchers used the data from six previous studies carried out on 257 dogs and combined them with new behavioral experiences.

Yawning is not related to empathy

Thirty doggies were thus subjected to two different exercises: in the first, a human who knows the animal, interacts with it, for example by playing with the ball or by stroking it. Then, he places the dog on a bed, begins to yawn in front of him, audibly and stretching. In the second scenario, there is no interaction: the human ignores the dog, avoids his gaze, eats in front of him without giving him anything. Then he yawns conspicuously, as in the first scenario. Result: in both situations, the dogs open their mouths wide in return.

"They did it even slightly more in antisocial conditions," said Patrick Neilands, of the University of Auckland, lead author of the study. "This surprised us," continues the researcher, quoted by AFP. Dogs would have been more likely to imitate a familiar person more than a stranger, since contagious yawning and empathy can have similar cognitive mechanisms. Especially since in humans, this empathic bias exists, the study points out.

This study therefore provides "proof that yawning in dogs, although contagious, is not linked to empathy", concludes the researcher. It is also, according to him, the “first robust proof of a contagious yawn in other species than primates” (the phenomenon had already been observed in chimpanzees). As for why a dog yawns outside of imitation reflexes, for the time being, science is dry.

Source: leparis

All life articles on 2020-02-16

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