Flashback Friday: Contrary to what your cats would have you believe, they do recognize your voice.

Photo: flickr/Tim DobbelaereThere are those of us who believe that our cats love us, and then there are these scientists, who questioned whether cats can even recognize the sounds of their owners' voices. In this study, they wanted to determine whether a cat was responding specifically to its owner's voice (rather than just any old voice). To do this, they "habituated" the cats to people calling their name by having three strangers say the cat's name. By the third time, the cat's ears barely twitched. Then the owner said the cat's name, and the cat responded, indicating that it could tell the owner's voice was "special". This still doesn't prove that the cats like us more than they would a food-dispensing robot, but hey, it's progress.Vocal recognition of owners by domestic cats (Felis catus). "Domestic cats have had a 10,000-year history of cohabitation with humans and seem to have the ...