The “So You Think You Can Dance” season is winding down along with its host, Cat Deeley, so that made me wonder if cats can dance. Answer: probably not, plus they find human movement a matter of supreme indifference.
When we walk, we see something and then remember to step over it. When you have two legs, this isn’t too big a deal. For quadrupeds, or those of us who may have 4 legs (and you all don’t know that I don’t because after all, on the internet no one knows you’re a dog), you need to remember much more.
Walking is more complex for quadrupeds: First, you step over something with your front legs, and you can see any objects to step over. Then, the object to step over is out of view as your body goes over it. Finally, you have to remember what the object was and appropriately lift up your hind legs to with this memory in mind.
Feline walking memory is now localized to a particular area of the feline brain.
David A. McVea, Andrew J. Taylor, and Keir G. Pearson, “Long-Lasting Working Memories of Obstacles Established by Foreleg Stepping in Walking Cats Require Area 5 of the Posterior Parietal Cortex,” J. Neurosci. 29: 9396-9404 (2009).
So do cats have the attention span to learn to dance? Probably not, and least of all by watching humans. For a cat, human images are intrinsically less visually interesting than inanimate moving objects as a visual attention-grabber, moreover, even with the most interesting visual images on a screen, cats lost interest after 3 hours total.
Ellis SLH, Wells DL , The influence of visual stimulation on the behaviour of cats housed in a rescue shelter, Applied Animal Behavior Science 113: 166-174 (2008)
How is your memory? Here is a Meowmory Game to test your memory.
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