Domestic cats distinguish their own names from similar words

Across several experiments in homes and a cat cafe, cats were played sequences of four nouns matched in length and accent followed by their own name. Many cats habituated to the nouns but showed renewed orienting responses to their name, demonstrating they can pick their name out from similar-sounding words. Cafe cats also distinguished their name from other resident cats' names, though less reliably. The work showed that cats attend to and discriminate human speech directed at them, even without explicit training for obedience, and it became one of the most widely reported demonstrations of feline auditory cognition.