This article is provided as a public service by the Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska Fairbanks, in cooperation with the UAF research community. Carla Helfferich is a science writer at the Institute.
Domestic cats are an oddity in the animal kingdom.
All other domesticated mammals are social animals that travel naturally in herds, flocks, or packs. Cats would rather be alone. Since people are also social animals, it's no wonder the two species have suffered from occasional missed signals as they've tried to get along together over the centuries. There's nothing in a cat's instinctive background to make it believe in a higher authority. Nevertheless, perhaps for their own amusement as much as practical reasons, cats usually attempt to gain the approval of the people with whom they live.