Have you ever met a psychopath? You might have one living closer than you think. So close, in fact, you might just be sharing the couch with one! That’s right; your adorable and bewitching kitty could be a psychopath. Psychology Today explains psychopaths tend to be callous, detached individuals with no empathy and high abilities in manipulation.
Yet, they can also be “charming.” This kind of sounds like a feline, doesn’t it?
Researchers from the United Kingdom’s University of Liverpool and Liverpool John Moores University noticed these similarities and set out to see whether or not some cats could actually be psychopaths. And while emotions work differently in the feline world, it turns out cats can exhibit some of the traits found in the clinical definitions of psychopathy.
Now you can take the quiz to find out whether or not your cat is a psychopath. Spoiler alert: The answer is most likely yes.
The Traits of a Feline Psychopath
Minna Lyons, one of the study’s authors, told Motherboard, she and the rest of the team are “crazy cat ladies” that came together to “see if psychopathy is something that is relevant in our feline friends too.”
“My personal inspiration is my cat Axel, a fluffy and greedy little creature,” Lyons shared with Motherboard. “Axel is totally bold, and known to go into neighbors houses, cars, and garages to search for food,”
And according to these behaviors, Axel could be a feline psychopath.
Lyons learned this fact about her cat from the 50-question quiz the team devised based on the “triarchic” concept that measures levels of psychopathy in humans. As it turns out, these same traits of boldness, meanness, and disinhibition can also signal psychopathy in felines as well. So can levels of human-unfriendliness and pet-unfriendliness.
Using the answers from the 549 cat parents who took the quiz, the team developed the Cat Triarchic Plus (CAT-Tri+) for measuring levels of feline psychopathy. And, Axel wasn’t the only of the teams’ cats to score high levels on the CAT-Tri+. Fellow researcher Rebecca Evan’s cat Gumball scored “relatively highly on the disinhibition scale—which means he can be quite vocal, proximity-seeking and excitable!”
Though Axel and Gumball both scored high levels, their results in certain areas varied, denoting that while both cats display psycho behaviors, they have different personalities. Those differences in feline personalities inspired the research, said Evans. She’s also curious to know “how owner perceptions of psychopathy in their cat can affect the cat-owner relationship.”
In this cat mom’s opinion, the info only confirms what I already suspected. My cats are psychopaths that play me like a violin. But my purr children aren’t alone. The team’s research indicates that all kitties likely have an element of psychopathy about them. It’s just the way of cats!
Now, are you ready to brave the quiz and find out if your cat is a psychopath too?
H/T: www.vice.com