Do cats really sit on laptops to copy their owners?

It's no secret that cats love to sit on laptops. But why they do this still remains a mystery.

Cats are notorious fans of sleeping on their owners' laptops. Similar photographs and videos are regularly found on the Internet, there are even some pages, dedicated to pets that interfere with their owners’ work. And in October 2020, users Twitter And TikTok stated that they even found an explanation for this behavior of pets. In their photos and videos, they argued that this is how cats try to copy their owners: in this way the animals try to be closer to the owner.

Cat lovers liked the idea so much that they began giving their pets old or cardboard laptops and distributed videos in which their cats were sitting at the next laptop, without touching the owner’s:

“I read on the Internet that cats get on your laptop because they copy you, and if you give them your laptop, they will leave you alone - and look at this businessman!”

Although the experiment was successful in the videos distributed, not everyone was able to repeat it: for example, a journalist from the American publication Slate I tried to do this trick with my cat and it didn’t work. Her friends, who tried to deceive their cats in this way, did not succeed either. Although the animals were initially interested in the object, they ultimately did not sit on it.

Fact-checking portal Snopes tried to test a hypothesis that originated on the Internet and contacted Christine Vitale, an expert in animal behavior from Human-Animal Interaction Laboratories Oregon State University. According to her, research can neither confirm nor deny that cats sit on laptops in an attempt to copy their owners. While copying is one possible explanation, there is not enough evidence that cats use laptops to be like us.

What's more, Vitale says, different cats may have different motivations for being on the computer.

"Some cats may sit on a laptop to be closer to their owner, while others may simply like the warmth of the device or may sit there for other reasons," Vitale explains. “Each cat is different, and we can’t assume that all cats behave the way they do for the same reason.”

However, Vitale adds, it is likely that the cat is trying to spend time with its owner and attract his attention. And a good way to do this is to be where the person's gaze is focused.

Although people often believe that cats are not particularly social animals, this is not true. Research showthat cats are facultatively social, that is, they can either exist alone or enter into complex social relationships, including with people. Like dogs, they can form bonds with their owners. IN some research It even turned out that some cats may prefer social interaction with humans to other possible rewards. Therefore, the owner's attention can truly be an important part of a cat's life.

“If a cat doesn't engage in enough interactions with its owner, it may begin to engage in behavior to get their attention, such as meowing or approaching the person and spending time near them,” Vitale explains. “If the owner works on a laptop all day, it is logical that the cat might approach this place in an attempt to attract the owner’s attention.”

This is not accurate

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

1. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/cats-sit-on-laptops/
2. Vitale K.R., Udell M.U.R. The quality of being sociable: The influence of human attentional state, population, and human familiarity on domestic cat sociability
3. Vitale K. R., Behnke A. C., Udell M. U. R. Attachment bonds between domestic cats and humans