Why Do We Yawn...?

Today for Monday Mysteries, we have another medical question. It's about yawning...

This is one of those things that we probably don't think about too much. Not only humans do it, but so does most of the animal kingdom. And another strange thing, it seems to be contagious!

Why Do We Yawn?

Everybody yawns. It’s not even just humans who do it—most animals yawn, too. But not matter how universal yawning might be, we have absolutely no idea why we do it.

People have been trying to figure out why we yawn since the fourth century BC. Hippocrates suggested that it might be to get rid of “bad air” and take in “good air.” Today, most people think it decreases carbon dioxide and increases oxygen levels in the blood, which means the same thing but makes you sound a lot smarter.

The problem with this explanation, though, is that it doesn’t really explain why we yawn when we’re tired. The logical explanation is that it has to do with the brain, but yawning doesn’t really seem to change the oxygen levels in the brain.

So why are we doing it? Why don’t we yawn when we really need that extra oxygen? Why don’t we yawn when we exercise?It doesn’t really make any sense, and we don’t really have a clear answer yet. As it turns out, that’s the case for a lot of things. We have our theories, but the truth is that there are a lot of aspects of the universe we just don’t understand

I don't exactly know why we yawn...but I do know that a yawn is just a silent scream for coffee!

Coffee out on the warm patio again this morning!