Cats Are Actually Nice, Scientists Find

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Cats Are Actually Nice, Scientists Find

Sorry, haters.

Let me tell you about my handsome son, Mizue. He's a cat. He cuddles up beside me and pushes his little furry head against me when he wants to be petted. He purrs and rubs up on everyone he meets. He's the best dude, is what I'm saying here, and I am goddamn sick of people saying that cats aren't nice.

Cats are nice.

But don't take my word for it. Thanks to new research from Oregon State University, published on Friday in Behavioural Processes, there is scientific evidence that cats are, according to empirical study, nice. In fact, the study concluded, cats like interacting with humans more than they like eating food. Let that sink in: more than food. I don't like anybody more than food.

The motivation for the study was to apply cognitive tests that have already be tried out on dogs and tortoises on cats, in order to clear up some misconceptions around cats' bad reputation for being unsociable.

"Increasingly cat cognition research is providing evidence of their complex socio-cognitive and problem solving abilities," the authors wrote in the paper. "Nonetheless, it is still common belief that cats are not especially sociable or trainable. This disconnect may be due, in part, to a lack of knowledge of what stimuli cats prefer, and thus may be most motivated to work for."

Read the rest on Motherboard.