If we are in a simulation, maybe yawning is an animation glitch.
As far as I know, the purpose of yawning isn't really understood, but it's present in nearly all land vertebrae. Maybe it's a universal bug in the breathing animation code.
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I thought I'd read that yawning is just to help boost your oxygen levels, but I don't have sufficient motivation to actually look it up.
That's easy to check. I'm currently insanely jet lagged and super tired, yawning every few minutes. My pulse oximeter is indicating 99% saturation, so that's not it.
Edit: on the other hand, I'm a flight attendant, so my body is used to lower oxygen atmospheres, so I usually have >98% O2 levels.
Maybe you're at 99% because you've been yawning?
Ok, I am sufficiently caffeinated and bothered to look up a study: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3678674/
According to the above, they suspect it has to do with helping to keep you relative alert/awake but also, possibly to cool the brain and adjust ear pressure.
The thing is that my o2 saturation doesn't drop between yawns, which is what leads me to believe that's not it.
Yeah, there doesn't seem to be anything (at least in that study) to suggest it actually impacts blood oxygen levels either.