Dogs seem to be born unable to hide their inner emotions – they will fidget, sniff around, and wag their tails as a sign of satisfaction, nervousness, or pure joy. We can easily see through their minds.
Cats' body language is also complex— a fluttering tail, wrinkled fur, and the pointing of ears and whiskers reveal their emotional state. Purrs are usually (but not always) representative of kindness or contentment. Generally speaking, we can use body language to discern whether the cat in front of us is annoying.
Dogs and humans are known to be intimate. Cats, which have been domesticated for thousands of years, still seem to need to improve their public image. Many people think that independent personality is a very plus trait, but some people think that such cats are too arrogant and selfish. Cat-haters claim that cats only get close to humans when they are hungry.
Cat and cat shovelers must find these claims unreasonable, insisting that cats, like dogs, have a deep affection for their owners. If so, why do people still think that cats are cold and unfriendly? Are they wrong?
To understand why cats don't seem friendly enough, you need to understand how they were domesticated. Compared with dogs, cats are domesticated more slowly and not quite like dogs.
About 10,000 years ago, the first domesticated cats appeared in Neolithic Middle Eastern villages. Cats at the time did not rely on humans to feed them, and humans guided them to guard the granaries to catch rats and other pests for a living. From the beginning, cats were not as close to humans as dogs, after all, dogs would help people hunt and share their prey.
Your cat, now curled up on the couch or looking down at you at the top of a bookshelf, retains many of its pre-domesticated nature, such as hunting, patrolling territory, and monopolizing territory; cats are more similar to their ancestors than dogs. Humans have not yet fully domesticated the wild nature of cats.
"Humans mostly misunderstand cats," said Karen Hiestand, a veterinarian at International Cat Care, "dogs and humans are very similar, have lived together for a long time, and in a way, the two are co-evolving." Cats have been domesticated for a shorter time, and their ancestors were not social animals. ”
The ancestor of domestic cats, the African wildcat, loved to live alone and would only look for its kind during the mating period. "The only solitary animals domesticated by humans are cats, and the other domesticated animals are social animals."
Cats are so different, it's no wonder we misunderstand their messages.
Herstand said: "Because cats are independent and will take care of themselves, more and more people like to keep cats. But whether humans can accept the cat's lifestyle is another matter entirely, and some people want cats to act like humans or like dogs, but this is impossible. ”
Although research on cat emotions and sociality lags a lot behind dogs, it has grown in recent years. Most studies are still in their infancy, but have shown that the relationship between cats and humans is quite complex.
"Genetically influenced, the relationship between cats and people is very different, their closeness to humans depends on the experience of the first 6 or 8 weeks after birth, if cats are happy with humans during this period, then they may prefer humans and prefer to hang out with humans."
Domestic cats and humans vary in their closeness. Stray cats that hide or run away when they see humans are more like wild cats. In places like the Mediterranean and Japan, certain fishing villages are home to many stray cat groups, which are friendly and good at catering to the inhabitants who feed them.
The cats we live with are also different; some keep their distance from humans, and some are very clingy.
What do we need to do if we want to be intimate with a cat?
Like dogs, cats communicate primarily through body movements rather than sounds. Kristyn Vitale, a PhD student who studies cat behavior, said that "it is more difficult for people to read the body language of cats than dogs." But this obviously can't blame the cat.
Researchers at Portsmouth University in the United Kingdom have found that dogs can imitate the expression of babies, which stimulates the love of owners and is one of the important reasons why dogs are more likely to win love than cats. The muscles around a dog's eyes raise the inner eyebrows — an ability that its ancestor wolves didn't have. "Dog eyes" are not clichés, but rather advantages that gradually evolve over time, and this advantage strengthens the emotional connection between dogs and people.
However, cats don't have that muscle. The cat's eyes look a little cold and heartless, and the two cats looking at each other may be a precursor to a big fight. But when cats blink slowly and look at you from the other side of the room, the meaning is completely different — they are expressing love. Turning your head to the other side doesn't mean disdain, you're relaxing yourself.
Wäytar had conducted such a study at Oregon State University: Owners left cats and dogs alone in their rooms and returned abruptly after a while. "Interestingly, most cats only go up to their owners when they return, after which they explore the room alone and rarely return to their owners, but dogs are pretty much the same."
"If the dog comes back to the owner after running around the room and playing with toys, we won't be so worried," Vajtar said. The researchers call this phenomenon "secure attachment" — both the cat and the dog calm down when the owner returns, which indicates that they have a strong emotional connection with the owner.
"The expected bias of humans towards animals can affect the behavior of animals," Vajtar said. "Expecting cats to be as enthusiastic as dogs is actually forcing them to go against their nature."
Part of the problem, Hirstand said, is that humans have been ignoring the fact that cats and dogs have different temperaments, even experts who have been trained for years are not immune. "I was in a conference in 2007 and I felt like an idiot," she says. I don't know a lot of basic information about cats, such as their liking to separate places to eat and drink. The perspective of research is completely new, and once you realize that what you know about cats is wrong, you start learning interesting things. ”
Cats like to rub around on people. It was previously thought that cats were marking territory, just as feral cats would rub on trees or markers to divide the territory. But in reality, the cat rubbing on people is usually a symbol of connecting each other – the cat will rub the smell of your body on you, and will also rub your smell on yourself. They also rub their cat allies like this. Creating a "common smell" is how cats and cats distinguish between friend and foe.
The key, Hirstand says, is that relaxed cats are more likely to make friends. "After they are satisfied with food, water, and the places to eat and drink, they are in the mood to socialize."
So, the next time you get home, if you find your cat looking at you motionlessly on the couch, or lazily lying in the hallway yawning, don't be disappointed, the cat is actually welcoming you home in its own way.
Source: Leviathan, Popular Science China
Editor: Yip Ka Shing