Socio-spatial cognition in cats: Mentally mapping owner’s location from voice

予期せぬ場所から聞こえる飼い主の声にびっくり --ネコは耳で飼い主の位置を捉えている--. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2021-11-22.Many animals probably hold mental representations about the whereabouts of others; this is a form of socio-spatial cognition. We tested whether cats mentally map the spatial position of their owner or a familiar cat to the source of the owner’s or familiar cat’s vocalization. In Experiment 1, we placed one speaker outside a familiar room (speaker 1) and another (speaker 2) inside the room, as far as possible from speaker 1, then we left the subject alone in the room. In the habituation phase, the cat heard its owner’s voice calling its name five times from speaker 1. In the test phase, shortly after the 5th habituation phase vocalization, one of the two speakers played either the owner’s voice or a stranger’s voice calling the cat’s name once. There were four test combinations of speaker location and sound: Same[sound] Same[location], Same[sound] Diff[location], Diff[sound] Same[location], Diff[sound] Diff[location]. In line with our prediction, cats showed most surprise in the Same[sound] Diff[location] condition, where the owner suddenly seemed to be in a new place. This reaction disappeared when we used cat vocalizations (Experiment 2) or non-vocal sounds (Experiment 3) as the auditory stimuli. Our results suggest that cats have mental representations about their out-of-sight owner linked to hearing the owner’s voice, indicating a previously unidentified socio-spatial cognitive ability

ネコはここまで考えている 動物心理学から読み解く心の進化

令和4年度京都大学人と社会の未来研究院若手出版助成事業の支援による京都大学大学院文学研究科の『卓越した課程博士論文の出版助成制度』への応募があった平成29年4月から令和4年3月までの博士（文学）学位論文から、選考を経て、下記の7冊の書物が刊行されました。松葉 類『飢えた者たちのデモクラシー --レヴィナス政治哲学のために』ナカニシヤ出版、2023年3月25日刊、xii＋251頁鶴来 航介『木材がつなぐ弥生社会 --木工技術論の再構築』京都大学学術出版会、2023年2月5日刊、xvi＋544頁谷口 良生『議会共和政の政治空間 --フランス第三共和政前期の議員・議会・有権者たち』京都大学学術出版会、2023年3月20日刊、xviii＋594頁髙木 佐保『ネコはここまで考えている 動物心理学から読み解く心の進化』慶応義塾大学出版会、2022年9月24日刊、iv＋116＋60頁山岡 翔『ベトナム語北部方言の音節論 --音声から音韻へのアプローチ』京都大学学術出版会、2023年3月31日刊、xvii＋308頁杉本 陽奈子『古代ギリシアと商業ネットワーク』京都大学学術出版会、2023年3月31日刊、vi＋332頁髙木 裕貴『カントの道徳的人間学 --性格と社交の倫理学』京都大学学術出版会、2023年3月31日刊、x＋410

Cats match voice and face: cross-modal representation of humans in cats (Felis catus)

We examined whether cats have a cross-modal representation of humans, using a cross-modal expectancy violation paradigm originally used with dogs by Adachi et al. (Anim Cogn 10:17–21, 2007). We compared cats living in houses and in cat cafés to assess the potential effect of postnatal experience. Cats were presented with the face of either their owner or a stranger on a laptop monitor after playing back the voice of one of two people calling the subject’s name. In half of the trials the voice and face were of the same person (congruent condition) whereas in the other half of trials the stimuli did not match (incongruent condition). The café cats paid attention to the monitor longer in incongruent than congruent conditions, showing an expectancy violation. By contrast, house cats showed no similar tendency. These results show that at least café cats can predict their owner’s face upon hearing the owner’s voice, suggesting possession of cross-modal representation of at least one human. There may be a minimal kind or amount of postnatal

Microsatellite Polymorphisms Adjacent to the Oxytocin Receptor Gene in Domestic Cats: Association with Personality?

A growing number of studies have explored the oxytocin system in humans and non-human animals, and some have found important genetic polymorphisms in the oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) associated with the bonding system, social behaviors, and personality in several species. Although single nucleotide polymorphisms in OXTR have been well-examined in various species, microsatellites (or short tandem repeats) adjacent to OXTR have rarely been studied, despite some suggestions that microsatellite polymorphisms near genes might play a role in genetic transcription and translation. In this study, we surveyed microsatellites in the upstream, intron, and downstream regions of OXTR in domestic cats (Felis catus). We succeeded in amplifying 5 out of 10 regions, and recognized these five regions as polymorphic. We compared allele frequencies in these five regions between mongrel cats in Japan (n = 100) and cats of 10 pure breeds (n = 40). There were significant differences in allele frequencies between the two populations in all microsatellite regions. Additionally, the owners of mongrel cats answered a comprehensive personality questionnaire, and factor analysis extracted four factors (Openness, Friendliness, Roughness, and Neuroticism). We examined the association between the microsatellite genotypes, age, sex, neutering status, and personality scores. Compared to their counterparts, younger cats tended to score higher on Openness, male cats scored higher on Friendliness, and female and neutered cats scored higher on Roughness. When we divided the sample into three groups depending on the length of alleles, we found a marginally significant association between Friendliness and MS3. Additionally, we found a sex-mediated effect of genotypes in MS4 on Friendliness, resulting in different effects on females and males. Our findings that mongrel cats had longer alleles in MS3 and MS4 than purebred cats, and that those cats tended to score higher on Friendliness, supported the previous findings. However, future studies such as comparison between purebred cats with apparently different origin or personality are required to determine the association of genetic variants in the OXTR with personality

Cats learn the names of their friend cats in their daily lives

日常生活の中でネコは友達のネコの名前を学習する. 京都大学プレスリリース. 2022-04-25.Humans communicate with each other through language, which enables us talk about things beyond time and space. Do non-human animals learn to associate human speech with specific objects in everyday life? We examined whether cats matched familiar cats’ names and faces (Exp.1) and human family members’ names and faces (Exp.2). Cats were presented with a photo of the familiar cat’s face on a laptop monitor after hearing the same cat’s name or another cat’s name called by the subject cat’s owner (Exp.1) or an experimenter (Exp.2). Half of the trials were in a congruent condition where the name and face matched, and half were in an incongruent (mismatch) condition. Results of Exp.1 showed that household cats paid attention to the monitor for longer in the incongruent condition, suggesting an expectancy violation effect; however, café cats did not. In Exp.2, cats living in larger human families were found to look at the monitor for increasingly longer durations in the incongruent condition. Furthermore, this tendency was stronger among cats that had lived with their human family for a longer time, although we could not rule out an effect of age. This study provides evidence that cats link a companion's name and corresponding face without explicit training

Sociality of Cats toward Humans Can Be Influenced by Hormonal and Socio-Environmental Factors: Pilot Study

Individual differences in the sociality of cats are influenced by inherited and environmental factors. We recently revealed that hormones can make a difference in intraspecies social behavior. It remains unclear whether cat behavior toward humans is modulated by hormones. Therefore, we analyzed the relationship between cat behavior and their basal hormone concentrations after spending time together with human experimenters. In addition, we analyzed the relationship between cat behavior and the timing of when the individual cats began living with a human because the sociality of cats could be dependent on their developmental experiences. The results showed that male cats that began living with humans earlier had more contact with an experimenter. In addition, individual male cats with low testosterone levels were more likely to interact with an experimenter. These findings of this pilot study suggest that the sociality of male cats toward humans is affected by testosterone and the age at which they begin to live with humans

Do cats (Felis catus) predict the presence of an invisible object from sound?

Available online 17 July 2015Recognizing invisible entities from auditory information is advantageous to animals in various situations including predator avoidance and foraging. In 2 experiments we asked whether cats could predict the presence of an unseen object on hearing noise it made, based on a causal-logical rule. After observing an experimenter shaking an opaque container for 15 seconds (observation phase), the cats freely explored the environment for 15 seconds (response phase). Experiment 1 tested 3 conditions. In the first, “contingent noise” condition, the object inside the container made a rattling noise when shaken. In the second, “irrelevant noise” condition, white noise accompanied the shaking action. In the third, “no noise” condition, the shaking action was silent. Experiment 2 tested a “noncontingent noise” condition, in which the rattling noise and movement of the container were out of synchrony. In both experiments cats looked at the container for longer in the “contingent noise” condition than the other conditions. These results suggest that cats used a causal-logical understanding of auditory stimuli to predict the presence of invisible objects. This ability may be related to the ecology of cats' natural hunting style

Microsatellite Polymorphisms Adjacent to the Oxytocin Receptor Gene in Domestic Cats: Association with Personality?

A growing number of studies have explored the oxytocin system in humans and non-human animals, and some have found important genetic polymorphisms in the oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) associated with the bonding system, social behaviors, and personality in several species. Although single nucleotide polymorphisms in OXTR have been well-examined in various species, microsatellites (or short tandem repeats) adjacent to OXTR have rarely been studied, despite some suggestions that microsatellite polymorphisms near genes might play a role in genetic transcription and translation. In this study, we surveyed microsatellites in the upstream, intron, and downstream regions of OXTR in domestic cats (Felis catus). We succeeded in amplifying 5 out of 10 regions, and recognized these five regions as polymorphic. We compared allele frequencies in these five regions between mongrel cats in Japan (n = 100) and cats of 10 pure breeds (n = 40). There were significant differences in allele frequencies between the two populations in all microsatellite regions. Additionally, the owners of mongrel cats answered a comprehensive personality questionnaire, and factor analysis extracted four factors (Openness, Friendliness, Roughness, and Neuroticism). We examined the association between the microsatellite genotypes, age, sex, neutering status, and personality scores. Compared to their counterparts, younger cats tended to score higher on Openness, male cats scored higher on Friendliness, and female and neutered cats scored higher on Roughness. When we divided the sample into three groups depending on the length of alleles, we found a marginally significant association between Friendliness and MS3. Additionally, we found a sex-mediated effect of genotypes in MS4 on Friendliness, resulting in different effects on females and males. Our findings that mongrel cats had longer alleles in MS3 and MS4 than purebred cats, and that those cats tended to score higher on Friendliness, supported the previous findings. However, future studies such as comparison between purebred cats with apparently different origin or personality are required to determine the association of genetic variants in the OXTR with personality