You call your cat from across the room.
One ear moves.
You try again, this time with more enthusiasm. The cat remains exactly where it was.
Did it recognize its name? Was that ear movement the entire response? Researchers have looked at this, and the answer is more encouraging than your cat’s performance might suggest.
In a 2019 study, scientists played cats a series of ordinary words, followed by their own names. Among cats that had become less responsive during the ordinary words, attention increased again when their names were played. Household cats could distinguish their names even when an unfamiliar person said them.
The responses were often subtle. Ear and head movements were much more common than getting up or making a sound. In other words, the scientists did not require the cat to come running before giving it credit for recognizing something.
I think that is a useful standard for the rest of us, too.
Recognizing a name does not necessarily mean understanding it as a personal identity in the human sense. It could be a familiar sound associated with attention, food, play, or other experiences. The study established discrimination between sounds, not a feline understanding of birth certificates.
Then researchers took the question a step further.
A 2022 study tested whether cats connected the names of other cats in their household with the correct faces. They played a familiar cat’s name and then showed a photograph on a screen. Household cats looked longer when the photograph did not match the name, suggesting that something about the pairing violated their expectations.
The cats had not been given special lessons in who was who. They appeared to have picked up these associations during daily life. The researchers could not determine exactly how they learned them, and cats living in cafes did not show the same result.
Still, it is a charming possibility: while you have been calling one cat for dinner and telling another to leave the counter, someone else in the room may have been learning the household names.
I would not turn this into a test your cat has to pass. Call once and watch carefully. Give a small response some credit.
Your cat may be taking in more than it chooses to demonstrate. The fact that it remained on the good cushion does not settle the matter.
Ezra Ameis, DVM
Paw Priority, Los Angeles