Introduction

With so many people owning cats, understanding cat behaviour in the human home is important. Cats are the largest pet population in the USA. In 2011, of 374 million pets in the USA, 86.4 million were cats. In the same year, 78.2 million were dogs (ASPCA, 2012). In 2010 in the USA more than 22 billion dollars were spent on cat food (American Pet Products Association, 2011). Most of the research on domestic cat behaviour has been obtained from studies of cats in shelters, in laboratory situations or in free-roaming (feral) situations. Veterinarians and animal behaviourists have relied on information gained from studies of these populations for information about the normal behaviour of domestic cats. Most of the interactions people have with their cats is in the home. Domestic cats rarely accompany their owners outside of their homes. According to the recent American Pet Products Manufacturers Association’s Pet Owners Survey, 3% of cat owners in the USA take their pets with them when they travel for at least two nights compared with 19% of dog owners (American Pet Products Association, 2011). In a recent repeated-measures study, cats were present with their owners 6% and dogs were present with their owners 19% of the time the owners were outside of the home (Friedmann et al., 2010). However, very little is known about cats’ behaviour in the home.