A very good evening to my fellow friends and our lovely Dr Teoh Swee Ai.

Yawning is cool. That is the thing i would like to talk on today. But let me ask you
my dearest friends, how would you wonder this act of opening your mouth
actually is cool? According to researchers Andrew C. Gallup and Gordon G.
Gallup, Jr. from Binghamton University, a little act of yawn actually helps the
brain.The statement that i ran across in an article in Reader’s Digest stated that
that breakthrough report says our brain can burn up about 33 percent calories
we consumed by generating heat during yawning!. Amazed by the fact, i decided
to run the research on this mystery of yawning. We tend to yawn mostly when
we feel bored, tired and sleepy. But why do athletes on the running track also
yawn before the competition? Is it just an involuntarily act? In science, we do
have explanation for almost all things. We yawn and there must be reasons
behind it. I have found three interesting main topics to be discussed on today
that are the theory of yawning, non-human(animals) yawning and
contagiousness of yawning. But i prefer to elaborate more on its contagiousness.

My friends, do you ever noticed that a little yawn of your next friend
sometimes trigger you just to open your mouth and breathe deeply too? I
confess that this thing really and always happen to me during lecture whenever
i’m seeing some next friends yawn. And i noticed some also yawn back
whenever i yawn. Thats it. Looking at yawning people really can make your
mouth open widely. According to Steven Platek, Ph.D, 40 to 60 percent of the population
is susceptible to contagious yawns. Yawning basically means large gaping of mouth,
accompanied by deep inhalation and followed by shorter expiration. The proximate
cause of contagious yawning may lie with mirror neurons in our brain. Guys do you what is
mirror neurons? A neuron that is fire both when animal sees the action performed by other
and animal imitates the action that has been performed. In human, mirror neurons lies in
premotor cortex and inferior parietal cortex area of brain. It is proved through functional
magnetic resonance imaging of brain that area of premotor cortex and inferior parietal cortex
in their brain are active whenever human performed imitation. Thus, when we yawn back at
looking of others yawning, it is correlate that our mirror neurons has been activated and we
are triggered to imitate the yawn back.

Regards to mirror neurons, what neurologist found next through brain imaging is a really
amazing finding. It is found that the part of brain that deals with empathy is associated with
the same part of contagious yawning that is mirror neurons. To prove the theory that
contagious yawning is related to empathy, psychologists at Leeds University have conduct
research on 40 psychology students and 40 engineering students. Each student was made
to wait individually in a waiting room with an undercover assistant who yawned 10 times in
as many minutes. The result stated that psychology students whose future profession
requires to focus on other yawned contagiously an average of 5.5 times while engineering
students who tend to focus on things like numbers and systems-yawned on average less
than psychology students that is only 1.5 times. Besides, empathy is taught and learned
throughout our life as we growing up. However, children under age of 5 less likely have
developed empathy that is why they also not susceptible to contagious yawning. Same goes
to autistic people who have trouble connecting with others and find it difficult to feel empathy.
Through a study by cognitive researcher Atsushi Senju on normal children and autistic
children at age of 7-15 found that normal kids yawned contagiously on clips of people yawn
but not to autistic kid.
 Now as i am drawing to conclusion, i would like to emphasize again that
proximate cause of contagious yawning in human is basically an imitation
reaction trigger in mirror neurons. And this mirror neurons also related to
empathy. Empathy has to be developed while we grows up that is why baby n
infants not susceptible to contagious yawning. Thus it was hypothesized that the
more likely you developed your empathy towards other, the more likely you are susceptible
to contagious yawning. Now you have the idea and do try to practice it on your friends. It
might say that they are nice as when they are yawning more contagiously but not when they
develop yawn by self.