Related Experiment Video
Updated: Sep 3, 2025
06:49
A Laboratory Method to Measure Contagious Yawning in Rats
Published on: June 14, 2019
7.1K
Interspecific Contagious Yawning in Humans
Andrew C Gallup1, Sabina Wozny1
1Psychology and Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences Programs, SUNY Polytechnic Institute, Utica, NY 13502, USA.
Animals : an Open Access Journal From MDPI
|July 27, 2022
Summary
People can catch yawns from other species, demonstrating interspecies yawn contagion. This contagious yawning response occurs across diverse animal groups, regardless of relatedness or domestication.
Area of Science:
- Ethology
- Comparative Psychology
- Interspecies Communication
Background:
- Contagious yawning is a well-documented phenomenon in humans and social vertebrates.
- While typically occurring between conspecifics, some captive animals exhibit yawn contagion with humans.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether humans exhibit contagious yawning in response to non-human animal yawns.
- To determine if phylogenetic relatedness and social closeness influence this interspecies yawn contagion.
Main Methods:
- 296 participants completed a survey on Amazon Mechanical Turk.
- Participants self-reported yawning behavior after viewing control (non-yawning) or yawning stimuli from various species (fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, non-primate mammals, apes, domestic cats/dogs).
Main Results:
- Strong evidence for interspecific yawn contagion was found.
- No significant differences in yawn propensity or frequency were observed across different animal groups.
- The response was consistent regardless of phylogenetic distance or domestication status.
Conclusions:
- The mechanisms of contagious yawning can be triggered by diverse yawning stimuli, including those from unfamiliar and distantly related species.
- Interspecies yawn contagion is a robust phenomenon, suggesting shared neurological pathways for social-induced yawning.
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