...says that it's equally likely that only those three types of behaviour are seen by humans as worth sticking on YouBoob.

Sorry lads. Your sample is so biased it's unbelievable.

Hardly just the sample size, as the basically arbitrarily define two traits based on a few behaviors and then find a spectrum of expression of those traits.

Funny thing, people may find when you map data across any two arbitrarily defined poles and divide your graph into three sections, it doesn't necessarily mean anything at all.

But that is what happens when you take a tiny and non-representative sample size and try to infer causal traits from a statistical analysis way down in the noise floor.

Has to be a contender for an "igNobel" prize.

I might get a citation or two by letitng pussyGPT loose on a collection of Attenborough's DVDs and submitting the output to a gullible or mercenary journal.

You mean these people got PAID to watch cat videos on YouTube!?

Or maybe they got CAUGHT watching cat videos on YouTube and reckoned they'd be fired if they didn't publish a paper about it?

Hey! I get paid for watching videos on yt. Only, my employer doesn't know.

Only "irritating narcissist" has so far been discovered.

After cohabitation for nine years with three feline overlords, all three got along fine. Then, sixteen months ago, I was tasked with finding homes for an additional three male kittens. I was unsuccessful finding new serfs for these junior overlords and ended up keeping them myself. Recently one of the youngsters has begun bullying the oldest one, causing her to fear using the home's common areas, which includes my bedroom and bed. I miss her company at night, I guessing I'm suffering from a severe case of Stockholm Syndrome, wherein I've become emotionally attached to my captor. Perhaps these scientist's study can give me insight to what I can do to alleviate the tensions in the home.

Further exasperating the situation is that an additional two older overlords came to share our space just after Christmas. Thank dog we've got plenty of square footage here but the situation is far from ideal. Tensions are too high, and they seem to be getting smarter and more clever in the ways that they torture me. I think the only thing keeping me alive is my opposable thumbs, without which the overlords cannot get into closed rooms, either to get additional food or to attack me, their humble servant.

Introducing new felines into a cat system that has achieved stability is asking for trouble. Sometimes it results in a new point of stability that is advantageous to all, sometimes it results in kitty kaos where nobody ends up happy.

"sometimes it results in kitty kaos where nobody ends up happy, and everything winds up pissed on."

FTFY.

Not just your opposable thumbs. It's also their lack of internet access. Just imagine if our overlords were to get to see human videos!!!! Peoples! Peoples videos!

Do not show your kitty anything on the internet via your tablet. KItties and tablets do not mix!

"Recently one of the youngsters has begun bullying the oldest one"

Totally normal feline behavio(u)r when the youngster doesn't believe the nominal head of household (that would be you) is in charge. He is pushing the limits, trying to figure out where his position is in the pride hierarchy.

Solution: Become the Boss ... at least in the eyes of the youngster.

Gosh! Lucky I came across this 'cos the idea that animals can be either:

a aggressive

b wait to see what's actually going to happen

c shy, afraid and defensive

is scary to somebody who has enjoyed the company of cats most of his life. Does this mean I need cages, engagement protocols and cat-counselling, or will I get away with just a few cardboard boxes on the one hand and a vacuum cleaner on the other?

Either they like you, or they don't.

If they don't, you might have food anyway.

So basically cats are just like people, we see the same variants with dogs and many other animals too. If you read Neil Shubin's views on human evolution (which I think are extremely accurate) then you can see that we, as humans, may see ourselves as different from animals but in fact we all started the same originally. Yes, we've evolved but so has everything else too and we share a lot of the same history. We didn't evolve to like cats but I suspect cats have evolved to like us because we like cats.

Cats like us for the same reason dogs do ... we have extra/leftover meat, and are willing to share.

There was no procrastination involved. Someone worked out a way to have someone else pay them to watch cat videos. Full marks for that, I say. I only wish I'd thought of it first.

Are they writing up papers now by watching YouTube video's and distilling conclusions from these?

What's the world coming to?!

Probably suggested by Le ChatGPT.

But just like April Fools RFC's and papers on the neurology of zombies, the strictest adherence to form and protocol is essential.

Funny idea, but weak math, to reference to foundational or prior research, poor study design, and no self aware mea-culpa to the limits of their own in-jest findings.

Break to many of the rules at once, and you make yourself the butt of your own joke.

At least it's not a meta study. Sadly it may be ingested by them in the future due to it's publication. Garbage in...

If you assign things to one of three categories, you get three categories?

If a cat could text you to say how it felt, it wouldn't

If a cat could stand on your sleeping chest and lick your nose to say how it felt, it would.

If a cat could leave leftover rodent parts just exactly where you step when you get up in the middle of the night for a pee, just to show you what an awesome hunter it is, it would.

Cold rat guts squishing through your toes, 3am wondering if this will happen enough times to get them to drop it just 18" further, just onto the tile floor, so you don't have to scrub the carpet for an hour on your hands and knees trying to erase the signs of their love before you lose your cleaning deposit whilst counting your blessings that at least they aren't leaving them on your chest in the middle of the night to let you experience waking up to the feline equivalent of a godfather move.

Out of love. We accept them as they are because they accept us as THEY are.

and write a paper about researchers observing cats? I have a theory that there are 11 kinds of researcher:

1 -The trend follower

10 -The cat lover

11 -The Trend following cat lover

Now all I have to do is get funding.

You'll never get funding. Your proposal is far, far too binary for this modern era.

My wife feeds and vets 35 cats. They suffer from three common traits:

1) they burn cash at an alarming rate.

2) they produce a large amount of shit.

3) they are all bloody annoying.

That must be true love! If wifey cared for 36 cats she wouldn't be wifey

"1) they burn cash at an alarming rate."

Would that be the cats, or your wife?

"2) they produce a large amount of shit."

Stop feeding them. No more problem.[0]

"3) they are all bloody annoying."

Would that be the cats, or your wife?

[0] THAT'S A JOKE! Never withhold food from a cat! In extreme cases a healthy cat can occasionally go 10 days or two weeks without food and survive. However, it comes at a cost. Even healthy cats who don't eat for 24 to 36 hours should be considered at risk, and in need of emergency vet care. I won't go into the details of why (look up feline hypoglycemia and hepatic lipidosis if you want to know). If your cat skips meals for a day (24 hours) for no apparent reason, get it into the vet, pronto!

Cats can go without water for about the same amount of time as you can, about three days. However, again it can come with a cost, specifically kidney damage or failure. As with food, if your cat refuses water for a day or so, it's vet time.

Note that I am not a vet! This is not a diagnosis! Don't take the word of some random dude in an obscure techie forum on the Internet as gospel when it comes to the proper medical care of your critter(s)! Instead, ask your vet for verification. Your mog will thank you.

In related news: scientists have proven that cats are either Small, Medium-sized, or Large. Among those groups they tend to be young, middle-aged, or elderly.

There is also feral, repatriated feral, and domestic.

The should have used computer vision pose estimation to reconstruct the poses of the cats and clustered them. Feels very subjective to have a human literally watching videos and deciding what kind of behaviour is being exhibited

Cats have way more operating modes than this. There's sleepy mode, there's cuddly mode, there's goddamn pissed at you mode, there's hungry mode, there's zoomies mode, there's playful mode, there's grooming mode, there's let's kill something mode...

They seem to have only looked at videos where cats interact with other cats and determined that 2+ cats interacting with each other can be 1) playful, 2) unhappy, 3) unsure. This seems to miss the grooming mode, sleeping together mode, and ignore each other entirely mode, among others.

But what do expect from youtube.

Bloody thing from down the street insists on regularly parking it's breakfast on my back lawn.

But only if you're looking at him