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 5^th 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_soundSame_location, Same_soundDiff_location, Diff_soundSame_location, Diff_soundDiff_location. In line with our prediction, cats showed most surprise in the Same_soundDiff_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.

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.

Physical and mental effects stemming from COVID-19 have impacted not only people’s lives but also the lives of their pets, which in recent years are often seen as members of the family. This study aimed to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan on pets and their owners. Participants reported changes in physical activity and mental health, as well as working conditions and frequency of interaction with pets, before and after behavioural restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We also asked about their pets’ behaviours using the Feline Behavioural Assessment and Research Questionnaire (Fe-BARQ) and the Canine Behavioural Assessment and Research Questionnaire (C-BARQ). This study showed that most cat and dog owners spent more time at home due to the COVID-19 behavioural restrictions and that the frequency of contact interaction with their pets increased. However, this study showed higher stress-related behaviours (e.g., cats: excessive grooming; dogs: aggression towards owners) among pets whose owners increased contact interaction. Furthermore, owners’ low mental health was correlated with high stress-related behaviours (e.g., touch sensitivity) in pets. The results of this study indicate that the lockdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan may have affected not only the lives of owners but also the interaction between owners and their pets, and consequently their pets’ behaviours. Therefore, there is also concern that changes in lifestyle patterns caused by pandemics could form a negative feedback loop between the health status of both owners and their pets.

It is well known that dogs are capable of following human verbal instructions. However, very little is known about the equivalent ability in cats. In this study, we used a switched stimuli task to examine whether cats rapidly form picture-word association, which is a fundamental ability for word learning. We presented cats with two meaningless picture-word combinations, in the habituation phase. Then, on half of the trials we switched the combination (switched condition), but the other half of the trials remained as before (non-switched condition). If cats rapidly form picture-word association, they were expected to look at the monitor for longer in the switched condition, reflecting detection of the change. We used human speech as stimuli in Exp.1, and mechanical sounds (electronic sounds) in Exp.2. Cats expressed detection of the switched combination in Exp.1, where human speech and objects were paired. However, in Exp.2 where non-social sounds and objects were paired, there was no statistical difference between switched and non-switched conditions, although there was a main effect of condition when the data from the two experiments were pooled. These results demonstrate that cats can rapidly form picture-word association. Further research should investigate whether domestication has played a role in this ability.