A recent study is the latest to cast doubt on the idea that cats are heartless rulers of their domains: Based on interviews with hundreds of cat owners, scientists found evidence that cats routinely grieve after the death of other household pets, even dogs.
Humans aren’t the only animals that mourn their dead. Dolphins, elephants and other highly social animals have also been observed to show signs of grief, such as mother killer whales cradling the corpse of their recently deceased calves. Recent studies have also shown that dogs can show deep sadness when humans or other pets die. But cats and their grieving abilities have received relatively little scientific attention. Scientists at Oakland University in Michigan set out to remedy that.
According to a new study published last month in the journal Applied Animal Behavior ScienceThe researchers surveyed more than 400 cat owners who had previously lost a pet, and were asked about any short- and long-term behavioral changes in their surviving cat after the death.
Related article: Do dogs think about the past?
Overall, the team found that cats may experience similar behavioral changes seen in studies investigating grief in dogs. Cats may eat or sleep less, seek more or less attention from their owners, or even “appear to be searching for their deceased companion,” the researchers wrote. And the longer a cat lived with its deceased companion or the better the relationship, the more signs of grief it seemed to show. About two-thirds of the cats had lived with other cats, while one-third had lived with a dog.
The findings are based on subjective reports from cat owners. And the researchers found that owners who reported spending more time with their cats and those who experienced deep grief from the death of their pets were more likely to see their cats grieving. This means that people may not be seeing the genuine sadness of their surviving cats, but may simply project their own loss onto the cat. According to the scientists, this is only the second study to look at whether cats mourn other pets in the household. So, at the very least, more research needs to be done to confirm the phenomenon of cat grieving.
“Future research is needed to determine whether these results reflect owners projecting their own grief onto their surviving animal companions or whether cats also experience grief after the loss of a companion,” the researchers wrote.
But given other research showing that cats are not as emotionless as commonly thought, it makes sense to expect that cats would, and do, miss the animals that come into their lives.
