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mise à jour du
6 février 2005
Cogn Brain Res
2005;23(2-3):448-452
pdf 
Contagious yawning and the brain
Platek S, Mohamed F, Gallup G
Department of psychology, Phildelphia, USA
 

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All articles about contagious yawning
 
 
 1. Introduction Contagious yawning, the onset of a yawn triggered by seeing or hearing someone yawn, or even reading, or thinking about another person yawn is a well-documented phenomenon. Contagious yawning is independent
of generalized emotional contagion, occurs in 40Ð60% of adult human research subjects [18,21], and has also
been reported in chimpanzees.
 
It has been hypothesized that contagious yawning may be related to empathy. Specifically, contagious yawning
is thought to be a primitive expression of cognitive processes involved in self-awareness and theory of mind, the ability to empathize with and infer what others want, know, or intend to do. Seeing or hearing another person yawn may act as a
releasing stimulus that activates neurological substrates that initiate yawning. Thus, it may be that contagious yawning
occurs by activating a system that is also involved in modeling other aspects of interpersonal mentality at conscious
levels. Two recent studies have provided support for this hypothesis. Platek et al. [18] demonstrated that susceptibility to contagious yawning increases among people that can identify their own face faster and do better on theory of
mind tasks. Further, Platek et al. demonstrated that susceptibility to contagious yawning is negatively correlated with expression of schizotypal personality traits, which have been shown to impair self-processing and theory of mind.
 
Anderson et al. has also provided support for the empathic modeling hypothesis of contagious yawning by demonstrating
contagious yawning in chimpanzees. The importance of this study is that chimpanzees, unlike most other primates,
also show rudimentary forms of empathy and selfawareness. In line with these data, the empathic modeling
hypothesis predicts that species who do not recognize themselves in mirrors and do not show evidence of mental state attribution ought to fail to show evidence for contagious yawning.
 
An alternative hypothesis of contagious yawning is that it may be related to an innate imitation system driven by the
so-called mirror neuron system. That is, contagiou yawning is presumed to be an automatic mirroring mechanism related to synchronizing one's own behaviors with others. One way of investigating these hypotheses is to explore the neural correlates of contagious yawning.
 
However, the neural substrates recruited during contagious yawning are unknown. In the present study, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate the brain substrates involved in contagious yawning when compared to laughing, which is also reported to be contagious, and a neutral expressive condition. We hypothesized that neural substrates known to be involved in self-processing and mental state attribution would be recruited when viewing yawn videos. Specifically, we predicted significant activation in right prefrontal substrates [19,20] and midline cortical
structures
 
2. Materials and methods
 
2.3. Design
The study was designed to measure blood oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) responses to viewing and responding to videos of people yawning and laughing. A boxcar (block) design was used, in which participants were shown three 7-s video clips in a 24-s block (1 s inter-stimulus interval). There were three video conditions: neutral, laugh, and yawn. Each block consisted of only one type of video. There were 6 neutral/null blocks and 5 yawn and laugh
blocks. Participants were asked to look at the images and respond yawn or laugh using a button press using an MRI compatible response pad (Resonance Technologies, Inc.). Stimuli were delivered through stereoscopic goggles
designed for use within the fMRI environment (Resonance Technologies) and Neurobehavioral Systems Presentation software (www.neurobs.com).
 
2.4. fMRI image processing and analysis
 
3. Results
No significant activation was observed when contrasting laugh with the null stimulus, nor was there any significant activation when contrasting laugh minus yawn. Table 1 and Fig. 1 depict the significant activations associated with the
yawn minus laugh contrast. This contrast revealed significant (FDR-corrected P b 0.01) activation in bilateral posterior cingulate (BA 31) and precuneus (BA 23), and bilateral thalamus and parahippocampal gyrus (BA 30), which supports the hypothesis that viewing yawns may evoke self-referent information. Activation in the posterior cingulate/precuneus region has been associated with selfreferent processing and retrieval of autobiographical memories. Activation in the thalamus and parahippocampal gyrus may be related to general sensory aspects of face perception.
 
platek
4. Discussion
In contrast with laughter contagion, our findings suggest that there are unique neural substrates involved in contagious
yawning. This phenomenon has been of interest to researchers for decades but until now no one had identified the neurobiological substrates involved in the process.
 
Our findings also support the empathic modeling hypothesis by showing significant activation in bilateral precuneus and posterior cingulate. These regions have been implicated in identifying self-referent information. Thus, it is possible that contagious yawning is a primitive form of empathic modeling that is subserved by substrates that are precursors to a more sophisticated and distributed system involved in conscious self-processing (e.g., theory of mind, self-face recognition). The posterior cingulate/precuneus region has been implicated in identifying words that describe oneself, retrieval of autobiographical events/memories, engaging in self-generated actions and self-monitoring, and discriminating between theory of mind stories and "physical" stories.
 
Furthermore, several studies have also implicated medial/midline cortical structures in self-processing. For example, Vogely et al. demonstrated that medial prefrontal regions are associated with taking one's own (first person) perspective and another person's (third person) perspective when solving an avatar task. Gusnard et al. demonstrated that activation in medial prefrontal and anterior cingulate regions vascillates depending upon attentional demands of self-referent or externally cued conditions. We did not find significant activation in other regions that have been associated with self-processing, such as the right prefrontal cortex. This lack of involvement is consistent with the empathic modeling hypothesis, which suggests that contagious yawning is a primitive, unconscious form of empathic modeling and hence would not be expected to activate regions associated with conscious recognition of self-processing.
 
Additionally, the yawn minus laugh contrast revealed significant bilateral thalamic and parahippocampal gyrus (BA 30) activation. These activations are likely related to the visual and facial sensory processing of the stimuli. In a recent study of familiar face recognition, Blonder et al. report that presentation of both human and dog faces activated so-called "face areas" (e.g., fusiform gyrus, inferior occipital gyrus), but the parahippocampal gyrus was uniquely activated by human faces. We observed similar activations when contrasting yawn with the null condition (neutral face video) when we did not apply P value [FDR] correction
 
Our findings support our hypothesis that viewing yawns activate regions implicated in self-processing, but not the hypothesis that viewing yawns activate areas associated with the mirror neuron system. In fact, we found no evidence of activation in areas that would suggest contagious yawning is related to the mirror neuron system (e.g., left inferior frontal gyrus, frontalÐparietal network, etc.). Platek et al. reported that the susceptibility to contagious yawning was reduced in subjects with increased levels of schizotypal personality traits and suggested that schizophrenic-spectrum traits negatively impact susceptibility to contagiously yawn. Patients with schizophrenia and schizotypal personality disorder show metabolic decreases and structural asymmetries in the posterior cingulate region [12], which may contribute to a failure to show contagious yawning. Also, given that chimpanzees, but not monkeys, show the capacity for mirror self-recognition, theory of mind and contagious yawning, it would be interesting to study the behavioral and neural correlates of contagious yawning in other species as well.
 
In conclusion, our findings point to a relationship between watching videos of people yawn and posterior midline cortical regions, which supports the hypothesis that contagious yawning may be a primitive form of selfprocessing, subserved by similar neural substrates.
 
platek
 
-Schurmann M, Hari R et al Yearning to yawn: the neural basis of contagious yawning NeuroImage 2005; 24; 4; 1260-1264
-Gallup A, Gallup G. Yawning as a brain cooling mechanism: nasal breathing and forehead cooling diminish the incidence of contagious yawning. Evolutionary Psychology www.epjournal.net &endash; 2007. 5(1): 92-101
-Gallup AC, Gallup GG Jr. Yawning and thermoregulation. Physiol Behav. 2008
-Platek SM, SR Critton, et al Contagious yawning: the role of self-awareness and mental state attribution Cogn Brain Res 2003; 17; 2; 223-7
-Platek S, Mohamed F, Gallup G Contagious yawning and the brain Cognitive Brain Research, 2005;23:448-452
 
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