WHY WE YAWN.

Clutha Leader, Volume XXXIX, Issue 52, 11 February 1913, Page 1

WHY WE YAWN.

Yawning is generally attributed to a. tired condition <>' body, i>ut it appears to be also associated with a state of health. . All American writer explains how yawning is divided into three classes. "We are always partly asleep or never really awake —some part ol the body dormant most ol the time, savs the 'Chicago Examiner.' "This is especially true of the lungs, every cell of which should lie used with every breath we draw, but. which are generally only half used. H is been use oi this sleepy condition ol the lungs that we yawn. "A veallv good hearty yawn is uni of the finest aids to health, second onlj to the habit of laughter. If it is truo that one inav 'laugh and glow tat. it is also true that one may 'yawn and grow fat,' for both have the same power of bringing into plu.v all the cells of the lungs, which should be used for infusing oxygen into the blood. "It is evkhmt that there are all the time in most of us a number of cells that want to he emptied, but- which we do not take llu* trouble to free hecause we can get along till right with tho cells that are working, and these are enough to keep the blood in fairly good condition. None tho less, tho lower cells of the lungs are all tho time striving to he emptied, either by a dee)) breath, a sigh or a yawn. "Yawns arise from three causes—• either "because there are so many cells out of commission that those remaining cannot keep up the burden of oxygenating the blood, which is the cause, ol yawning when we are tired and sleepy before going to bed or on awakening in the morning; or it may be due to a change in the nature of the atmosphere in the cells that aise working, 1 such as the deep breaths one teels im- | polled to take when the air is unusualI ly pure, and which is due to a stimula- ; lion transmitted from the upper cells ' to those which are lower; or it may ho psychic in its origin, being due to the : effect of tho unconscious mind on the ' air-breathing organs. In this latter class belong emotional sighing and contagious yawning. ■ "The contagion of yawning has nothing to do with the nature ol the air '■ expired, because a mechanical device ot a figure opening , and shutting its mouth widely will provoke yawning almost immediately, and the small boy has often spoiled a party by holding his hands together with the palms curved away from each other, keeping the wrists together."