Scientists Confirm You Can Communicate With Your Cat by Blinking Very Slowly

Compared with dogs, cats have a reputation for being standoffish. Maybe you're not speaking their language because your cat is hard to bond with.

It's not difficult according to research. You have to smile at them more.

The cat way of smiling is by narrowing your eyes and blinking.

Scientists were able to confirm that blinking slowly makes cats approach and be receptive to humans after observing cat-human interactions.

When the results of the study were published, a psychologist said it was great to show that cats and humans can communicate.

It's exciting to have found proof that it's true, because many cat owners had already suspected it.

If you've ever seen cats, you've probably seen their partially closed eyes and slow blinking. It is similar to how human eyes narrow when smiling. A kind of cat smile is what the expression is meant to be.

Evidence suggests that humans can copy this expression to communicate with cats that we are friendly and open to interaction. The psychologists designed two experiments to see if cats behaved differently towards humans.

The owners slowed-blinked at 21 cats from different households. The owners were told to sit about a meter away and slow-blink when the cat looked at them once the cat was settled in their home environment.

The owner's face and the cat's face were recorded and compared to how cats blink.

Cats are more likely to slow-blink at their humans after they have slowed-blinked at them.

There were 24 cats in the second experiment. It wasn't the owners who did the blinking, but the researchers who had never met the cat. Humans stared at the cats without blinking their eyes for a control.

The researchers added an extension hand to the slow-blink process. The cats were more likely to approach the human after the human blinked than before.

The study is the first to look at the role of slow blinking in communication between humans and cats.

It is possible to try it out with your own cat at home or with cats in the street. It enhances the relationship you have with cats. Close your eyes for a couple of seconds if you want to narrow your eyes. You can start a conversation with the way they respond.

For cat lovers, the slow blinking phenomenon might not come as a surprise.

Recent research shows that our feline friends are more in tune with their human housemates than was previously thought, and that comparing them to dogs is a disservice.

Cats respond in kind to humans who are receptive to them, so if you find cats standoffish, that could be a problem with you.

Cats are similar to the humans they live with in that they have the same personality quirks. Although they ignore them a lot, they can recognize their names. Their bonds with their humans are deeper than expected.

It's not clear why cats slow-blink at people.

It is1-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-65561-6556 It is difficult to tell with domesticated animals.

It seems like it helps forge a relationship. That is a positive thing to know. Learning how to improve our relationships with these enigmatic animals could be a way to improve their emotional health, not just in the home environment, but across a range of potentially stressors.

The research was published in a peer-reviewed journal.

The October 2020 edition of this article was published.