11 Most Pointless Scientific Studies Ever
3. Yawning Isnt Contagious In Red-Footed Tortoises
Scientists at the Department of Cognitive Biology at the University of Vienna had a burning question: Do red-footed tortoises find yawning contagious?
They set up a complex series of experiment in which they conditioned one lucky red-footed tortoise to yawn when it saw a little red flag. They then made it yawn in from of its fellow red-footed tortoises and found that it had no effect whatsoever.
They thought that this might be because the other red-footed tortoises could tell that the yawning tortoise wasn't doing it for realsies, so they then set up an experiment in which they showed the group a video of a red-footed tortoise doing a fake yawn, one of it doing a real yawn and one of just a blank wall. They observed that this also had no effect whatsoever.
They then wrote up all of their findings in No Evidence of Contagious Yawning in the Red-Footed Tortoise, and the world continued to turn as it always has.