Researchers at the University of Wisconsin are creating meow-sic that’s purrr-fect just for cats.
“Cats are not humans and humans are not cats and it is important that we humans, as the servants of cats, be aware of this difference,” says psychologist Dr. Charles Snowdon, the man behind the mission.
“We were motivated to make music for cats for two reasons,” he went on in The Huffington Post. “First, many pet owners told us that they play radio music for their pets while they are at work and we wondered if this had any value. Second, we have developed a theory that suggests that species other than humans can enjoy music but that the music has to be in the frequency range that the species uses to communicate and with tempos that they would normally use.”
Their process involves mimicking cat sounds using sliding notes and higher pitches. The tempo of the songs is based on purring and suckling sounds.
Now that they’ve figured out what kind of music the cats have a preference for, it has many potential implications, such as soothing shelter cats.
“We think of cats as highly independent of their human servants, but there is some research showing that cats experience separation anxiety, which is greater in human-raised cats than in feral cats,” Snowden told Discovery News.
Listen to some of the meow-sic here.
[Via HuffPost]