(ANSA) - PISA, 02 APR - The 'contagious' yawn, as a sign of empathy and social bond, does not only concern adults but is already present in children since the age of two and a half.
This is revealed by a study published in the journal Developmental Psychobiology coordinated by three ethologists from the University of Pisa, doctors Giada Cordoni and Eleonora Favilli of the Natural History Museum of Calci and Professor Elisabetta Palagi of the Department of Biology.
The research, the result of a broader human ethology project entitled 'Ontogenesis of social, playful and empathic behavior in humans: ethological observations on pre-school children', was conducted in a nursery school in Viareggio ( Lucca).
Here, videos were collected on children from two and a half to five and a half years old during their normal school activities and in the presence of teachers and classmates.
"Thanks to an accurate analysis of the video frame by frame - says Giada Cordoni - we have shown how the contagion of yawning, that is the involuntary replication of the motor sequence induced by viewing or listening to a yawn emitted by a partner, occurs during the development of human social and empathic behavior earlier than what has been demonstrated up to now, starting from the age of two and a half ".
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