FELINE TRAINING FOR A HAPPIER LIFE

The cat is unlikely to be the first animal one thinks of when thinking of animal training. Despite helping humans through their ability to rodent catch, the cat has never been selected for as a working animal, perhaps partly due to the belief that the cat was an independent and solitary animal.


This is in direct contrast to the domestic dog which we have trained for a number of tasks including retrieving, herding and scent discrimination, to name just a few.


Using food as a lure you can train your cat to put his head into his collar, resulting in the cat having positive associations with wearing a collar

However, the cat holds as much ability to be trained as many other species since it learns utilising the same principles of learning theory as other species. In fact, it is likely that we train our cats subconsciously all the time. For example, the cat may learn to sit by the back door and miaow because when it does this behaviour, we open the back door to let it out.


We positively reinforce this behaviour with the reinforcement of outdoor access which the cat desires, thus making the actions of sitting by the door and miaowing more likely to occur again. Subconsciously we are shaping our cats behaviour, although we often think our cat is training us!

However, why might we want to train our cats on a more formal level?


https://stanleyvetcentre.com/2012/08/27/feline-training-for-a-happier-life/