Is yawning contagious?
As seen in "MythBusters: Is Yawning Contagious?"
Thinkstock
Finding: CONFIRMED
Explanation: A 2006 study found that monkeys yawn in response to seeing other monkeys yawn. Could it be then that yawning is similarly contagious in humans, monkeys' fellow primates?
MythBusters Kari Byron, Tory Belleci and Scottie Chapman corralled unwitting volunteers to find out whether people unconsciously pick up this jaw-dropping behavior from each other. To that end, the MythBuster team converted a large van into a psychological chamber designed to relax participants and prompt them to unknowingly catch a yawn from Kari.
Many hours and many participants later, the MythBusters' data showed that when people inside the van weren't exposed to Kari's yawning, they still yawned 25 percent of the time. But when Kari caught flies in front of them, they yawned 4 percent more often. Though that's not an enormous increase, since they tested 50 people in the field, the gap was still wide enough for the MythBusters to confirm that yawning is indeed contagious.
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