Commentary: Yawning, acute stressors, and arousal reduction in Nazca booby adults and nestlings

Frontiers in Psychology

Andrew C. Gallup¹ 

关键词: yawning;    stress;    corticosterone;    contagious yawning;    thermoregulation;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01654

学科分类：心理学（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

Liang et al. (2015) recently reported on the relationship between yawning and stress responses in a wild population of Nazca boobies (Sula granti) in the Galapagos. Their analysis covered two separate investigations: a human capture-restraint stressor applied to adult boobies, and observations of nestlings maltreated by Non-parental Adult Visitors (NAVs). The authors conclude that the temporal sequence of yawning following these stressors provides support for the newly termed arousal reduction hypothesis, an idea initially proposed by Dourish and Cooper (1990), and demonstrates a communicative function to yawning. This study adds much-needed field data on patterns of yawning, stress and corticosterone in a natural context. Our commentary addresses the inference of a communicative function of yawning, discusses the match between the reported patterns and a thermoregulatory function, and draws attention to important shortcomings of the arousal reduction hypothesis as an explanation of yawning.

【 授权许可】

CC BY