\u201cFace it, your cat doesn\u2019t care about you,\u201d reads one headline. \u201cCats do not need their owners, scientists conclude,\u201d reads another. Poor cats, always getting bad PR.
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\nAs if it wasn\u2019t enough that Australia has declared war on feral cats, we now have a study that says cats don\u2019t need their owners. The research, from the University of Lincoln, adapted the Ainsworth \u201cstrange situation\u201d test, developed in the 1970s to observe just how attached children, and sometimes dogs (idiots), are to their caregivers. They found that when you put a cat in an unfamiliar room it does not look for reassurance from its owner or seem to miss them if they are absent. There\u2019s one potential explanation for this, it strikes me: cats, unlike children and dogs (idiots), are territorial \u2013 put them in a strange room and they will be too busy freaking out to look for reassurance. But that doesn\u2019t matter. The myth of the independent cat who sees humans as nothing more than handy food dispensers is firmly entrenched. As a cat owner, I am deluded enough to think that my cat loves me. And I have been racking my brain, and asking everyone I know, to come up with hard evidence of this fact.<\/p>\n
Your cat\u2026<\/p>\n
1. Greets you at the door. One colleague\u2019s cat recognises the sound of her husband\u2019s car in a busy street, and another\u2019s two cats sit on the garden wall waiting for her to come home from work.<\/p>\n
2. Follows you around. Does your cat come and hang out with you, in a sort of casual, hey what are you doing, oh taking a shower, well, I\u2019ll just sit down then, way? That\u2019s love.<\/p>\n
3. Stares at you. Unsettling. But cats only make direct eye contact with people they really like.<\/p>\n
4. Blinks at you. A long slow blink is a cat equivalent of a kiss. Do it back. But only if no one is watching.<\/p>\n
5. Meows. Cats do not meow to other cats, only to humans. This is my best cat fact. Your cat is talking to you. Your cat is telling you it loves you. Also: purring. Loudly.<\/p>\n
6. Tolerates affection. My cat lets me kiss her, even though she clearly doesn\u2019t like it. She may duck, but she doesn\u2019t run away, and I consider this a victory.<\/p>\n
7. Does not bite you. My cat has bitten all of my boyfriends to date. She has never, ever bitten me.<\/p>\n
8. Does bite you. Biting playfully is a sign of affection. My cat doesn\u2019t do this, she never plays. She is a sort of sentient, fluffy cushion, but I love her anyway.<\/p>\n
9. Head-butts you. When cats do this they are depositing their pheromones on you, and marking you as \u201ctheirs\u201d. They love you, they really love you.<\/p>\n
10. Comes to fetch you. When my cat feels I\u2019ve been in bed too long, she comes upstairs and meows until I get up. I now close the bedroom door at night.<\/p>\n
11. Breaks into your bedroom. Does your cat repeatedly thump the door, scratch the carpet or mew loudly and constantly outside the door? Love. I now shut my cat in another room at night.<\/p>\n
12. Touches you. One of my friend\u2019s cats taps her with his paw. Unbearably cute. A colleague\u2019s cat caresses her face. Someone else has trained their cat to kiss them on the lips. Aw.<\/p>\n
13, Licks you. An honour \u2013 you are considered part of your cat\u2019s family. (Also their tongues are rough and provide excellent exfoliation.)<\/p>\n
14. Kneads you. Like dough. Kittens do this to their mothers when they are feeding to increase milk supply, ergo your cat thinks you are its mother and adores you.<\/p>\n
15. Brings you presents. Cats love giving gifts! Popular choices are mice and birds, but don\u2019t discount frogs or worms.<\/p>\n
16. Gets jealous. It took me ages to work out that my cat was jealous of my computer \u2013 but she definitely is.<\/p>\n
17. Trips you up. Annoying perhaps, fatal, in the end (for you, not the cat). But when cats throw themselves to the ground in front of you or weave through your legs as you walk downstairs carrying a heavy tray of crockery, they are obviously telling you they idolise you.<\/p>\n
18. Makes a point. As my friend Jennifer said, when her cat pooed on her duvet immediately after she returned home from holiday: \u201cIf he didn\u2019t care, would he bother? I like to think not.\u201d<\/p>\n
19. Sulks. When I returned from a 10-day trip my cat refused to come out of the study for two days. But she wasn\u2019t aloof enough to stop herself meowing delightedly whenever I went in there.<\/p>\n
20. Sits on your lap. Constantly. If I am seated for more than a few seconds the cat materialises. A friend had a cat that tried to sit on her lap when she was on the loo.<\/p>\n
21. Sits on other parts of you. Like your head.<\/p>\n
22. Shows you their belly \u2013 the most vulnerable part of the cat. They trust you.<\/p>\n
23. Stays. Or as my friend John says: \u201cThey let you live in the same house as they do.\u201d<\/p>\n
24. Doesn\u2019t say no when you repeatedly ask \u201cdo you love me?\u201d I take my cat\u2019s silence on this issue as acquiescence.<\/p>\n
25. And finally \u2026 maybe your cat doesn\u2019t love you. At least, not in the way you think. There\u2019s no need to anthropomorphise them. Cat love, I suspect, is deeper, truer and more mysterious than the human variety.<\/p>\n