Touch your cat and let them touch you for health benefits both ways

A study is out on the Internet at the moment which probably states the obvious but it's always useful to restate the obvious and it might not be so obvious to some people. 😉😎

The conclusion of the study is that people benefit from touch. Yes, a simple act. Touching is part and parcel of the way of life of animals and people. People are animals. The human animal. Let's not kid ourselves that we are any different at a fundamental level which includes experiencing the benefits of touch.

Touch on the face and head is more beneficial than touch on the arm. We can be touched by a professional medical person or a non-medical person but someone we know and the benefits are going to be similar both mental and physical.

People who are ill benefit more than those who are not. Hugging people is touching people. The same benefits. Cuddling your cat is like hugging a person. The same benefits. It cuts both ways by which I mean the cat benefits from your touching and you benefit from touching your cat. Note: hug cats respectfully.

To stress the point, the study states that, "It is widely known that many animal species benefit from touch interactions and that engaging in touch promotes their well-being as well."

You can't really touch your cat enough. You can't overdo it but caregivers should respect the feelings of their cat. Petting your cat is good for both person and cat but different cats have different wishes and people shouldn't overdo petting. Sometimes cats have a limit to the amount of petting they wish to receive.

Notwithstanding that observation, cats enjoy petting and of course people enjoy petting their cats. This is a form of touching obviously and therefore both benefit from it.

Touching can help reduce pain, depression and anxiety in adults and children. In terms of newborn babies, touching helps them gain weight. This is a reflection of the general well-being incurred by the baby when being touched.

The study is titled: A systematic review and multivariate meta-analysis of the physical and mental health benefits of touch interventions. It is published on the Nature Human Behaviour website and the citation at the base of the article provides a link to it.

Overall, touch interventions were beneficial for both physical and mental health, with a medium effect size. Our work illustrates that touch interventions are best suited for reducing pain, depression and anxiety in adults and children as well as for increasing weight gain in newborns. 

The lesson to be learned from the study (if we need to learn a lesson on this topic) is that we should enjoy touching our cat. And our cat will enjoy it. It just needs to be done in a respectful way which means gently and up to the limits allowed by our cat companions. 

You will learn those limits as your cat will complain if you overdo it. Gentleness is a key. Sometimes people can handle their cats too roughly and forgetting that we are bigger and generally stronger. It's a two-way process at all times and interacting with our cat.

And don't treat your cat as a human baby but as a feline, a fine domesticated predator.

RELATED: Picture of Taylor Swift cradling Benjamin Button, her new cat, like a baby.

Citation

Packheiser, J., Hartmann, H., Fredriksen, K. et al. A systematic review and multivariate meta-analysis of the physical and mental health benefits of touch interventions. Nat Hum Behav (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-024-01841-8

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P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins.

Vulcan mind-meld with my cat!

Mind-meld: A touch technique that allows a Vulcan to merge his or her mind with the essence of another's mind purely by using specialized contact via fingertip-points.

It can be used in our relationship with our cat companion!! It is not quite the same thing but not far short. Just having a bit of fun.

Cats like to touch us; to make a direct physical connection and we like to do the same thing. When my cat did this to me this morning I thought of Stat Trek and Spock. 

RELATED: Domestic cats’ desire to touch tells us that they are sociable.

Touch and body language are more effective than vocalisations when communicating with your cat

I guess that this is common sense: humans have a common language with their cats which is touching i.e. physical contact in the form of petting et cetera, combined body language. Interactions between domestic cats often include physical contact such as rubbing against each other, licking each other and physically reaching out with their paw to touch the other. Domestic cats understand communication through touch and contact. And the meow is not for cat-to-cat communication. It was learned for cat-to-human demands.

Touch and body language are more effective than vocalisations when communicating with your cat. Cats understand the message when it is in the form of contact and touch far more so than in human vocalisations. Photo in public domain.

This is in contrast to the usual form of communication for humans, namely language and the sound of the voice. Cats don't understand human language although they do understand the tone of our voice and its volume and what it means in context. But they receive the intended message far more clearly when it is transmitted in the form of physical touch.

So, if you want to tell your cat that you love her, you gently stroke her and interact with her in a very loving way. Your cat will fully understand it. They will understand that you are friendly and affectionate and caring and loving. In short, for the feline, they will recognise you as friendly and protecting

Conversely, if you simply state to your cat that you love her, she won't get it. If you say it in a melodious way, she will get the message that you are being friendly, perhaps, but they might be a little bemused. The message is far less cleanly delivered using vocalisations compared to using physical contact provided it is carried out with tenderness and gentleness.

So, what does this mean? Well, the obvious: that in most of our communication with our domestic cat companions we should use body language and physical contact backed up with warm vocalisations. I use the word "vocalisations" because cats recognise sound, its frequency and volume but they don't obviously recognise the English language or any other language. And there is no point trying to make feline sounds because they won't understand those either.

It is also worth mentioning that physical contact with a domestic cat is often made within the context of a routine and the rhythms of life between cat and person, which also helps to clarify the message. In fact, routines are a very important part of communicating with a domestic cat.