There's a Weird Correlation Between Brain Size And Yawning, Study Reveals - ScienceAlert
A large-scale animal study has revealed something rather interesting about yawning: Vertebrates with larger brains and more neurons tend to have longer-lasting yawns.
Researchers collected data on 1,291 separate yawns from zoo trips and online videos, covering a total of 55 mammal species and 46 bird species, and found "robust positive correlations" between how long an animal yawns for and the size of its brain.The analysis was set up to test a hypothesis put forward in 2007 by one of the researchers that worked on this study: that yawning is an essential way of cooling down the brain.While there's more research to be done to tease out the reasons for why we yawn at all, the study authors conclude that "these findings provide further support for distinct predictions derived from the brain cooling hypothesis."