Friday, August 21, 2015

People with psychopathic traits are less likely to 'catch' a yawn than empathetic folks

Reading this, I started yawning!

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-08/bu-pwp081915.php

Public Release: 20-Aug-2015
People with psychopathic traits are less likely to 'catch' a yawn than empathetic folks
Baylor University

People with psychopathic characteristics are less likely to be affected by "contagious yawning" than those who are empathetic, according to a Baylor University psychology study.

Yawning after spotting someone else yawn is associated with empathy and bonding, and "catching" yawns happens with many social mammals, among them humans, chimpanzees and dogs, researchers say.

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"You may yawn, even if you don't have to," said lead researcher Brian Rundle, a doctoral student in psychology and neuroscience in Baylor's College of Arts and Sciences. "We all know it and always wonder why. I thought, 'If it's true that yawning is related to empathy, I'll bet that psychopaths yawn a lot less.' So I put it to the test."

Psychopathy is characterized by an antisocial lifestyle, including being selfish, manipulative, impulsive, fearless, domineering and, in particular, lacking in empathy, previous research has shown.

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Based on the psychological test results, the frequency of yawns and the amount of physiological response of muscle, nerve and skin, the study showed that the less empathy a person had, the less likely he or she was to "catch" a yawn.

"The take-home lesson is not that if you yawn and someone else doesn't, the other person is a psychopath," Rundle cautions. "A lot of people didn't yawn, and we know that we're not very likely to yawn in response to a stranger we don't have empathetic connections with.

"But what we found tells us there is a neurological connection -- some overlap -- between psychopathy and contagious yawning. This is a good starting point to ask more questions."

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