New study indicates that cats enjoy human company more than food

A new study reveals that cats don't just enjoy human company, they choose humans first, before food.

Oregon State University published their research on 24 March 2017 in the journal, Behavioural Processes, which concludes that cats enjoy human contact more than they enjoy eating.

Dispelling the rumour that cats are antisocial, they subjected cats to a series of tests to determine their choices in different situations. The researchers took 50 cats from shelters and people’s homes and deprived them of food, human contact, scent, and toys for a few hours.

They then introduced the cats to stimuli within these four categories to see which one they chose first.

Most cats chose human socialisation over any of the other categories. The authors of the study wrote: "While it has been suggested that cat sociality exists on a continuum, perhaps skewed toward independency, we have found that 50% of cats tested preferred interaction with the social stimulus even though they had a direct choice between social interaction with a human and their other most preferred stimuli from the three other stimulus categories."

The evidence is not categorical, of course, because it is only a 50% - half and half – result, and the cats were from shelters, which may mean that they were already deprived of human contact and affection before the testing. But, anyway, the study will give cat lovers some joy.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/03/27/cats-nice-enjoy-spending-time-humans-study-finds/

MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of:- The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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