title: Testing yawning hypotheses in wild populations of two strepsirrhine species: Propithecus verreauxi and Lemur catta.
abstract: Yawning, although easily recognized, is difficult to explain. Traditional explanations stressed physiological mechanisms, but more recently, behavioral processes have received increasing attention. This is the first study to test a range of hypotheses on yawning in wild primate populations. We studied two sympatric strepsirrhine species, Lemur catta, and Propithecus verreauxi, of the Ankoba forest (24.99°S, 46.29°E, Berenty reserve) in southern Madagascar. Sexual dimorphism is lacking in both species. However, their differences in ecological and behavioral characteristics facilitate comparative tests of hypotheses on yawning. Our results show that within each species males and females yawned with similar frequencies supporting the Dimorphism Hypothesis, which predicts that low sexual dimorphism leads to little inter-sexual differences in yawning. In support of the State Changing Hypothesis yawning frequencies was linked to the sleep-wake cycle and punctuated transitions from one behavior to another. Accordingly, yawning frequencies were significantly higher in L. catta than in P. verreauxi, because L. catta has a higher basal level of activity and consequently a higher number of behavioral transitions. In agreement with the Anxiety Hypothesis, yawning increased significantly in the 10 min following predatory attacks or aggression. Our findings provide the first empirical evidence of a direct connection between anxiety and yawning in lemurs. Our results show that yawning in these two strepsirrhines occurs in different contexts, but more research will be necessary to determine if yawns are a single, unitary behavior.
authors: Anthropology Laboratories, Department of Biology, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.
authors: Alessandra
authors: A
authors: Zannella
authors: Natural History Museum, University of Pisa, Calci, Pisa, Italy.
authors: Ivan
authors: I
authors: Norscia
authors: Anthropology Laboratories, Department of Biology, University of Florence, Florence, Italy.
authors: Roscoe
authors: R
authors: Stanyon
authors: Natural History Museum, University of Pisa, Calci, Pisa, Italy.|Unit of Cognitive Primatology and Primate Center, Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies CNR, Rome, Italy.
authors: Elisabetta
authors: E
authors: Palagi
mesh_terms: D000374:Aggression; D000818:Animals; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D005260:Female; D007900:Lemur / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D011235:Predatory Behavior; D012890:Sleep; D012919:Social Behavior; D011443:Strepsirhini / Q000502:physiology*; D015000:Yawning / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: anxiety; behavioral transitions; ring-tailed lemurs; sexual dimorphism; sifaka