If you have a cat as your pet, you may have noticed that cats turn around and bite our hands when you pet them. But why do they do that? Dog owners say that their dogs wag the tails, lick their hand and pant. They say that dogs don’t bite the hands that pet them. Though this is not some kind of competition between dogs and cats, but dogs are liked over cats for this.
So, what is the reason behind cats biting the hands that pet them? From what people claim, it seems like specialists do not agree to the reasons for the behavior of pet-then-bite, so, many theories exist regarding what is called petting induced attack.
According to one theory, unlike dogs that are very social, petting may be something beyond a normal instinctive behavior of a cat. Recommended solution for this is that cats have to be allowed to socialize with people as young kittens. Human contact of even 5 minutes every day of the life of a cat up to seven weeks of age will generate a much most reliable cat than those that did not have any human contact until they get older than seven weeks. After all, this solution doesn’t describe petting-induced attacking behavior as appropriately socialized cats can still show this behavior. And this solution does not help us who got adult cats.
Some specialists hypothesize that a cat may bite your hands when your petting goes more than her sensitivity boundary. While the cats like the human touch at first, but when the petting gets repeated over and over it becomes irritating and the cat turns around and bites, it is her way of saying that is enough. Another concept is that the petting not only results in irritation but that it may also result in pain because of the nervous system of cat. Sometimes the cat may feel pain in specific area and your touch or even the assumption that you will touch that part may induce the attacking behavior.