Do cats actually love their owners?

I think you've got to start this discussion with a definition of the word "love". And I think most people would agree that it means an intense affection for another. Although this is a very elastic definition. What I mean is that love is a very personal emotion. Different people have different depths of emotion for their significant other when they say that they love them.

And bearing in mind that the term is elastic and that the word "love" normally applies to the affections that a human has for another, it is impossible to come to any other conclusion that a domestic cat can love their owner, in their way, depending upon whether their owner loves them and treats them in a way commensurate with that love.

Love is a two-way street. A person can love another if that person doesn't reciprocate but it won't last. It'll fizzle out eventually. So, love feeds on the love of another. It is entirely mutual as I see it. The love of one magnifies the love of the other and vice versa.

So, taking that introduction into cat ownership, in the best examples, the cat owner loves their cat deeply. They care for them beautifully. They provide a beautiful, enriched feline environment for their cat which is thoroughly enjoyed. The caregiver feeds the best quality cat food and they spend hours together in play and cuddling.

Under that scenario, a cat will love their owner. I think it's impossible to come to any other conclusion. It has to be said, though, that we do not know what is in the mind of a domestic cat. At least we don't know what is in that mind accurately. We can guess through their body language and their vocalisations. But nobody has yet has actually truly read the mind of a domestic cat.

This mutual love between human caregiver and domestic cat is supported, I believe, by the fact that in this relationship the owner is a surrogate mother to an adult cat who feels like a kitten. That's because their every need is provided for. It's just like a cat mother is looking after their kitten.

This is a useful point to make because it supports what I have just said. A kitten is going to have a close connection with their mother and there will be a mutual love bond between them. That's exactly what the cat owner and their cat should replicate.

You can go further than that when the owner is imprinted on the brain of the cat that they are their true mother. This is when the owner has raised a newborn kitten and become imprinted on that kitten has a feline mother not a surrogate mother. And this imprinted mentality will be there for the rest of the cat's life. Under these circumstances there will be a special and super-close relationship of mother and offspring.

I think everybody would agree that the mother-to-offspring relationship is bonded by love and it doesn't matter what species of animal we are talking about.

But I have to return to the beginning and say that the word love is elastic. We don't know how cats feel except that we do know they feel contentment and pain. They are sentient animals. They indicate very strongly to us that they love being around us if we are good cat caregivers. 

They like to sleep on us and next to us. They like to lick us in a friendly example of allogrooming. They like our emotional warmth and our physical warmth. They like the way we smell. They greet us at the front door and they are thoroughly connected to us.

These are all the ingredients of mutual affection which when deep enough qualifies as love.

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The above section of this article was straight out of my head. That's me, Michael. I would like briefly to refer to the words of Dr. John Bradshaw who is a renowned cat behaviourist and who wrote the book Cat Sense. I'm referring to his book.

He says that domestic cats don't automatically love people. "Cat are not born to love people. It is something they have to learn when they are kittens-they do not automatically love other cats [either]."

In that statement Dr. Bradshaw is stating that cats have the potential to love people. He therefore supports what I have said above.

But the whole process of learning to love a person starts off with being socialised. Unless a domestic cat is socialised at an early age, they will probably never totally lose their inherent fear of humans. They will lose 99% of it if and when they are socialised later as adults but it is far better that they are socialised when they are newborn kittens. They lose the fear of people and then building on that they are able to love people especially their provider, their caregiver.

The video maker things cats can love their owners:

Mutual love gushing out of this feline-human couple

Mutual love gushing out of this feline-human couple. Screenshot.

This is a really good example of genuine love between human and cat. It is all over the screen. As I said it gushes out of each of them at any and every opportunity. They are made for each other and it is great to see. 

She says that she LOVES him and it is very obvious that she does. People say they love their cat or their human partner but don't always mean it truthfully or genuinely. But here it is genuine and absolutely true.

She says that in America they prefer to call ginger cats 'orange' rather than ginger in the UK. I have never heard that before. Ginger cats can be called 'yellow' or 'orange' or 'marmalade' or 'red'. The last one is the way the professionals refer to ginger cats.

RELATED: Orange, red, yellow, ginger or marmalade cats.

They are nearly always male. She relates to her cat as her man which I love. She seems to have given up on a conventional human-to-human relationship and prefers this sort which I can totally understand.

He makes her very happy. That is the measure of the relationship. If you see a human and cat getting a lot of happiness out of their relationship it is a big winner. It is all you can ask for in any relationship of any kind.

Her love for him means that she cares for him beautifully. Love brings respect and great caregiving. It all flows from that starting point.

As they say, if you want to know how to be an excellent cat caregiver: love him/her.  And of course, the nice touch is that he is a shelter cat. She saved a life as well. 

That is always a super starting point to a relationship. Cats show their gratitude.

Dog cat lovers in big bite embrace

Dog cat lovers in big bite embrace

I think that the title sums up the video quite nicely. These two are "lovers". That is the best description I can give them. The cat is entirely in the mouth of the dog. Of course, the dog is not biting but it's an amazing love bite! And the cat is reciprocating with her version of the love bite as well. Very cute video and another example of how dogs and cats can form incredibly close relationships as good as anything between humans and between cats and other cats.

Sweet hug from one stray cat to another

They very much look like sibling stray cats in a Mediterranean town somewhere. The weather is not bad there. In fact it can be great so not bad for stray cats from a climate standpoint which is why community cats are common in Mediterranean coastal towns where they are fed by tourists. These two look well fed and in good condition. I'd say that they are brothers. They are both tabby-and-whites, one brown/orange and the other with grey. I wonder if they are torbies?

SNuggling up to another for warmth and physical contact. Photo in public domain.

The beautiful aspect of the photo is the cuddle, the hug. He wants and needs that close contact with his sibling. It's probably partly to warm up (in may be in the early morning and a bit chilly) and to have that all important physical contact that cats enjoy when they can get it and when sutable.

It is an interesting thought as a lot of people think cats are entirely solitary. Not so for the domestic cat. And community cats are domestic cats, really. They live outside the home but have become socialised. Domestic cats are social animals to a large extent. They like to rest with some space between them but when they are friends they like the contact.

Scientists don't call them 'friends'. They call them 'associates'. I think they struggle with using human concepts on cats and don't want to be seen to humanise cats. But there is no reason to presume that cats can't have chemistry between themselves and can't even love each other as their anatomy is so similar. If their anatomy is so similar why can't their brains be similar too?

Love describes strong affections for another. Cats have emotions. They are sentient. They feel distress, depression and contentment. It is not a big step from there to having strong affection for another.

Unconditional love the primary benefit of the human-cat relationship (and verbal communication is the primary benefit in the human-human relationship)

The long title sums up the summary of a study published on the website Psychological Reports and which is entitled Attachment to Feline Companions. The study coordinators used a mail survey of 100 adult cat owners to investigate the attachment of cat guardians with their companion animals. 54 of the participants were members of a nationwide computer cat club while 46 were attending a cat show in Anaheim, California. The participants were therefore committed cat people.

Jay Leno and his cat.  Screenshot. Leno loves his cat and vice versa I'd say.

More than 90% of the participants said that they preferred cats to other companion animals because of the following:

• Ease of care;
• Affection and companionship;
• Personality.

The positive characteristics of the cat companion were linked with attachment and people tended to put aside feline behaviours which they might find difficult.

SEE MANY PAGES ON THE HUMAN-TO-CAT RELATIONSHIP

A comparison between the benefits of the cat-human relationship compared to the human-human relationship indicates that the participants appreciated the affection and unconditional love of the former and verbal communication as the primary benefit in respect of the latter

As we all know, the study organisers concluded that cat companions can be a very important source of pleasure and emotional comfort.

This study was published on June 1, 1994. A subsequent study published in September 2, 2015 concluded that domestic cats do not show signs of secure attachment to their owners. They decided that cats were "typically quite autonomous even in their social relationships and not necessarily dependent on others to provide a sense of security and safety."

The conclusions of the second study point to a one-sided relationship. The first study is about people appreciating the benefits of living with a companion and in the second study they seem to be saying that domestic cats do not appreciate the relationship quite as much as their owners.

The conclusion that I have is that studies about cats should not be entirely relied upon partly because they are conducted by people who often don't know cats that well or at all. Also, they frequently use questionnaires, and sending out questionnaires to people is fairly inaccurate at best.

Good cat guardians would say that they fully appreciate and rely on their cat companion's presence in their lives as a companion and as an excellent substitute for a human companion, very often. They will also state that they firmly believe that their cat loves them or at least demonstrates affection towards them. 

And that cats do appreciate the security and the general ambience and environment plus the food that there cat owner provides. The human-cat relationship is an interspecies relationship of which there are many. It is not just cats and people who become friends although that is the most common interspecies relationship together with the dog-human relationship.

You will see many dogs being friends with cats and cats being friends with squirrels and many other animals including deer et cetera. I believe that these are all genuine friendships. It looks that way to me. And if it looks like that it probably is that. We know that cats are sentient beings with feelings. It is a very short step from recognising that aspect of their being and behaviour to also accepting that they can make genuine friends, bonded through affection.

"Today I said goodbye to my buddy Benjamin: never experienced a more affectionate and loving kitty."

The full title: "Today I said goodbye to my buddy Benjamin. I adopted him as an older kitty and have never experienced a more affectionate and loving kitty. He was one in a million" is direct from reddit.com. I feel I need to comment on it here, on this website. When I comment on reddit.com it disappears. No idea why. I find the photo very sad. I guess I can feel the guy's distress as I have been through it before several times.  The passing of my first cat hurt the most. It was over 25 years ago and I still feel the emotional pain. It will never leave me. 

They say cats are members of the family. It is true and for me her passing was more distressing than the passing of my sister, mother and father. None of these deaths were anywhere near as painful as the passing of my darling cat. It was love. Anyway, I won't go on as it is too maudlin. Shouldn't indulge in self-pity. Have to move on. 

This guy's cat almost looks like a Bengal cat because of the strong tabby markings and the rich, golden brown background colour: very reminiscent of the Bengal. But I don't think so. He says that he adopted him as an older cat which might indicate a rescue cat. His cat looks elderly in the picture.

You can build a friendship with a cat even if initially you are not sure. Just be consistently loving and interact gently and frequently, over years and bingo, you will probably be handsomely rewarded with a very loving and attentive cat companion who'll sleep on your arm as you see in this photo from reddit.com.

Cat love - squishy face

There is almost nothing more that I like with respect to cat photography than these sorts of photographs where that is a lot of love in the human-cat-relationship. This looks like a young woman or girl with her cat companion. I expect that it is set up with the photographer telling the girl that she might like putting her cat over her shoulder to see if it creates a nice photograph, which absolutely does. A lot of pleasure is given both ways in this sort of relationship.

Photo: Reddit.com.