Contagious Yawning and the Brain

1. Contagious Yawning and the Brain Presented by Mona Zhu S.M. Platek, F.B. Mohamed & G.G. Gallup Jr.

3. Introduction Contagious Yawning: • Triggered by other people yawning • Well-documented • But don’t know very much about it • However…

4. Introduction We do know that: • Occurs in chimpanzees (but not monkeys) 2 Hypotheses: • Mirror Neuron Hypothesis • Empathic Modeling Hypothesis • Self-awareness, mental state attribution

5. Introduction Purpose of this Study: • Using fMRI to investigate brain structures • Compare contagious yawning with laughing (reported to be contagious) Hypothesis: • More activation in structures involved in self-processing & mental state attribution when viewing yawning videos • Prefrontal areas & midline cortical structures

6. Methods • 10 participants (Mage = 21.5 yrs) • 8 volunteers were filmed on video • Participants shown 11 blocks of videos • 1 block = 24s • consisting of 3 x 7s videos with 1s in between • Videos in the same block had same conditions

7. Results • Laughing VS. neutral  no significant activation • Yawn vs. laughing  significant activation • Bilateral posterior cingulate (BA 31) • Precuneus (BA 23) • Bilateral thalamus & Parahippocampal gyrus (BA 30)

8. Discussion • Independent of laughter contagion • BA 31/23 associated with self-referent processing • Supports Empathic Modeling Hypothesis • Did not find activation in right prefrontal cortex • Consistent with Empathic Modeling Hypothesis • Found no activation in areas implicated with mirror neuron system

9. Summary • Occurs in only a few primates • Related to empathy • Activates areas related to self-referent processes • Related to primitive, unconscious empathic modeling • Independent of emotional contagion

10. Questions? (I have chocolates for those that do!)