Oh dear. My family make fun of my cat Toffee (that's her, pictured above) because she is so grumpy and HATES visitors with a passion. She sits glaring at them until they leave and will hiss if they get too close. Now it seems the behaviour of cats may mirror that of their owners.
Research, conducted by the Nottingham Trent University and the University of Lincoln and published in the scientific journal PLOS One, surveyed more than 3,000 cat owners in the UK, asking questions about their personality and that of their pets.
Owners were scored on the Big Five Inventory personality traits: agreeableness, conscientiousness, extroversion, openness and neuroticism.
The survey found that different traits were linked to different behaviors in cats, for example, owners who reported that their cat had a behavior problem had higher neuroticism scores.
More neurotic owners were also linked to other negative traits in their pets, including stress-linked sickness, aggressive or anxious/fearful personalities and being overweight.
Owners who were more agreeable, meanwhile, had cats associated with a more positive wellbeing, and cats more likely to be a normal weight with less aggressive and aloof/avoidant tendencies.
“Our findings mirror the findings of research on parental personality, parenting styles and child behavior in various ways,” the study said.
Now, my cat may be a little grumpy but I categorically deny that she gets it from me and I love have family round. Never once have I been known to hiss at them!
Toffee is all over social media. Here's her blog: www.notsosweettoffee.com and you can follow her on Facebook, talk to her on Twitter, and idolise her on Instagram. She's even written a book. Take a look!
Not So Sweet Toffee - written by Toffee, the sassiest cat in the world!
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Oh, boy. This explains some things. ~grin~ Be well!
ReplyDeleteThat doesn't surprise me, really. My SIL talks about how weird her cats are. And I look at her...
ReplyDeleteI believe it. Cats perceive our feelings on some level and that might scare them. Much like a panicked parent might actually scare a child more than a non-panicked one. I love this kind of stuff!
ReplyDelete