Why do cats react to 'pat pat pat' by jumping up, how do they understand what it means?

[soupyspoon]

Its not a motion seen in any other species to indicate anything.

I have no idea but been wondering exactly the same thing. More or less the only ’command’ mine react to.

Oooh, I have often wondered this.

It may be related but I read that cats and dogs are almost the only species that respond to pointing and hand gestures, most don't - including primates who you might expect to be the best at interpreting human gestures.

I was wondering the exact same thing this morning!

What amazes me even more is that every dog I’ve had will ONLY jump up if I do the pat thing. Poodle will wake me at night to “ask” permission to jump up on the bed using the universal dog language of resting his chin on the bed and he wont jump up until the pat thing is done.

My dog is the same. She’ll stand on her back legs at the couch/bed, but won’t jump up until we pat pat.

I feel I’ve read somewhere that they (pets) see our hands as the primary point of contact with us. That’s because we stroke, rub, pat, and offer our hands to them first. Obviously because it’s easier for us, but animal to animal meet face to face, not hand to face.

so, following that logic, they must be looking at our hands for cues all the time.

Well, it makes sense to me! 😆

Just training, I think. They have learned that if they respond to pat-pat-pat by jumping up onto the thing that is being patted, they will get positive attention.

Not all cats will respond that way, and most cats will get up onto the bed or sofa or your lap when they want to, anyway, whether or not you have patted. And dogs are even more trainable than cats, so if a well-brought-up dog has been told off or punished for jumping up without invitation, it quickly learns to wait for the signal or ask permission.

My cats,are highly trained 😂
They know sit( hand palm facing them), Come up ( pat pat )
Lie down( palm down)
Go to bed( point at bed)

Its my party trick at my house parties
Started as kittens
Cats are easily trained but people assume they aren't

I don’t know, but someone needs to tell my youngest cat, who didn’t get the memo despite watching all of my other three cats responding to the patting. He just stares at me gormlessly every time.

I've known cats, dogs, birds and rabbits all respond to this. I think it's just because they generally get something out of it. Like being stroked or food or attention or whatever it is.

I thought this the other day because I realised my current cat is the only cat I’ve ever met not to do this. It’s like he’s got a bit of programming missing.

It’s weird because we have taught him to sit on command and he almost always comes when called but stares at you blankly when you pat pat pat.

My cat does not respond to this. She just stares at me for a bit and then walks away.

I train all my feral cats as i socialise them, to jump to wherever I am pointing as that is where the food is. So as they get used to that they learn the pat pat jump quite easily.

I mean, it definitely depends on the cat 😂

I was just wondering this the other day. However, it was more a 'who trained ME to know this gesture?'

It just seems I inherently know that this is language that cats will respond to.

My cat never got pointing at all, would just look at my finger 😆

I trained our last cat to sit on command, mainly because my DP said it wouldn’t be possible - I wanted to prove how smart she was. I just followed the same steps I would with a dog and she got it very quickly.

Both our cats have absolutely loved routine, and known exactly what’s happening at what time. I think a lot of it is audio cues - eg I’m usually last to bed and the sound of my electric toothbrush means Louie will hop into his bed in the kitchen.

I’d like to know how a cat knows how to use the litter tray? I know people say their mums teach them but what if they don’t? Our boy was born in a woman’s shed and lived outdoors until he was ten months old and she eventually took him and his sibling in (because it was by that point so cold, November in NE Scotland 😭) so presumably had been toileting outside until then. We adopted him the following April. Now he mainly comes in to use the tray if he’s out, whereas our previous girl wouldn’t look at it after we started letting her outdoors.

Yep the cat trained me!