Name: Why does seeing someone yawn make us yawn? 6 Minute English
Uploaded: 2022-06-21T06:31:45.000Z
Duration: 6 min 32 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Georgina: Hello. This is 6 Minute English,

Georgina: What do you do when you’re tired, Rob?

Rob: Right, well these days I just kind of

Rob: O h yes, hang on – yes, you’ve set

me off - yawning, yes yawning is a sign that

Rob: Well, because you did! That’s the thing

about yawns. They are contagious – they

Georgina: And that’s what we’re looking

at in this programme. But first, today’s

question. What biological function does yawning

have? Essentially, why do we yawn? Is it:

B: To get rid of carbon dioxide from our body

Rob: Ah – I know this. We yawn to take in

more oxygen. I’m pretty sure that’s it.

Georgina: OK. We’ll see if you’re correct

at the end of the programme. John Drury is

the BBC Radio 4 series All in The Mind he spoke

John Drury: Yawning is actually a difficult

It is the most contagious behaviour – it’s

meant to be automatic, it’s something that

you can’t stop. Dogs yawn when their owners

yawn, animals yawn to each other. It happens

whether you want to or not. These kind of

effects have been found for other kinds of

behaviour, so really, we were trying to push

it as far as we could and see if there is

a cognitive element to this influence behaviour.

Georgina: Which animal might yawn when its

Georgina: Yes, yawning is a very contagious

behaviour. The use of the word behaviour here

is interesting. Normally it is an uncountable

noun to describe the way we act – either

in a good or a bad way. We talk about, for

example, dogs' or children’s behaviour being

Rob: But it’s also used as an uncountable

noun when we are talking about a particular

action that, for example, an animal makes

in particular situations. These behaviours

are often not conscious, but are an automatic

Georgina: And the researchers were looking

to see if there was a cognitive side to the

behaviour. Which means they are looking at

the mental process – what is happening in

the mind to make us yawn, particularly when

whether you want to or not. These kinds of

and how close we feel to the people in it.

John Drury : So, the more that you identify

with the in-group target, the more likely

you are to copy their behaviour. What we do

when we see a behaviour is that at some level,

we are making a judgement about whether the

Subtitles ListPlay Video

Why does seeing someone yawn make us yawn? 6 Minute English

cognitive

relevant

essentially

conscious