Why Do We Hiccup? You Started Before You Were Born

Why do we hiccup? A hiccup is a breath your body cancels, and you were already doing it nine weeks into pregnancy. So what causes hiccups? Your diaphragm yanks air in, and about 35 milliseconds later your vocal cords slam the door shut. We follow the hic from your throat to the hiccup reflex in your brainstem, then meet Charles Osborne, who hiccuped for 68 years. Then the evolution question: why babies hiccup so much, the idea that hiccups are a leftover from tadpole gill breathing, and what hiccups might do for a newborn's brain. None of the explanations is proven yet. 00:00 The hic you didn't choose 00:27 Everybody hiccups, for no known reason 00:54 The hic sound: your vocal cords slam shut 01:16 The diaphragm's sudden pull 01:36 A breath cancelled in 35 milliseconds 02:20 Who gives the order: the phrenic nerve 02:42 The hiccup reflex in your brainstem 03:06 What causes hiccups to start 03:36 The hiccup rhythm 03:58 68 years of hiccups: Charles Osborne 04:34 A life lived between hics 04:59 Why keep the hiccup reflex at all? 05:11 Breathing practice in the womb 05:30 Hiccuping from nine weeks 05:48 Why do babies hiccup so much? 06:15 The tadpole idea 06:40 Same move: gill pumping 07:09 You were never a tadpole, but... 07:38 Other explanations for hiccups 08:08 Newborn hiccups and brain development 08:32 Hiccup myths 08:59 One of the oldest things you do Sources: Chang & Lu 2012, Hiccup: mystery, nature and treatment: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles... Howes 2012, Hiccups: a new explanation for the mysterious reflex: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles... Straus et al. 2003, A phylogenetic hypothesis for the origin of hiccough: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12539... Whitehead et al. 2019, Event-related potentials following contraction of respiratory muscles in infants: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles... UCL News 2019, Newborn baby hiccups could be key to brain development: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2019/nov/n... NHS, Hiccups: https://www.nhs.uk/symptoms/hiccups/ StatPearls, Anatomy, Thorax, Phrenic Nerves: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NB... de Vries, Visser & Prechtl 1982, The emergence of fetal behaviour: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7169027/ Guinness World Records 2023, Charles Osborne's 68-year attack of hiccups: https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/... Narration voice: Qwen3-TTS (synthetic). All animation, music and sound are original. This video explains physiology and is not medical advice. #hiccups #diaphragm #humanbody