In case you missed it, Saturday was International Box Day. While your kitty was enjoying that cardboard box, did you wonder why cats enjoy boxes so much? Scientists have studied the answer for you!
What Scientists Saw about Cats in Boxes
A Dutch animal shelter studied cats to see what their stress levels looked like when they were provided either a boxlike kitty condo or simply an open cage. Cats on shelter intake were selected either to get a hiding box in their cage or not. Then the cats were observed for two weeks, and their stress levels were assessed using a standard stress scoring system.
Cats who were able to spend time in boxes chose to spend over half of their time in them, so they made lots of use of them. By the third day, cats who had access to hiding boxes on average had lower stress scores. Over time, the cats without boxes slowly became less stressed until after two weeks their stress levels were about the same as the cats who had been provided hiding boxes from the beginning.
Why do Cats Feel Less Stressed in Boxes?
Cats get a feeling of safety from being inside that cardboard box. While it may look like your latest arrival in the post, to your kitty, that box’s enclosing sides represent a fortress.
As relatively small creatures, cats are wired to think of themselves as potential prey to many larger creatures. Curling up to sleep allows a cat to protect their most vulnerable parts, like their stomach, and curling up in an enclosed space like a bed with high sides or a cardboard box gives them an extra sense of being enclosed and protected.
How Boxes Can Help Cat Welfare
This is useful to know for your kitty at home, especially when bringing a cat home into a new environment like the cats brought into an unfamiliar shelter environment in the study. But it’s especially important information for cats in shelters.
For a shelter cat, acting less stressed-out can mean faster adoption. Faster adoptions by themselves can be lifesaving in overwhelmed shelters.
Stressed out cats, like stressed out humans, have elevated cortisol levels. Cortisol is an important hormone in your cat’s body involved in regulating blood pressure and immune function. This means that reducing the stress levels of shelter cats with boxes can help keep them healthier.
Does your cat prefer enclosed spaces like boxes when resting?
Research and further reading
Applied Animal Behaviour Science, Will a hiding box provide stress reduction for shelter cats?
Photo credits: depositphotos/Meldes, pannawat, cynoclub
Maybe that’s why we don’t particularly like boxes here – we are so secure in our home, we don’t need them! I will go somewhere more enclosed when I am away from home and in the middle of new surroundings, especially in a big room!
I’d actually really like to know why Nicki will chew up and spit out cardboard boxes, be they packing boxes or those great cardboard kitty condos. He has a “hate on” for cardboard — lol. Can anyone explain that? 🙂
Probably for the same reason they whack things off tables (like glasses) … BECAUSE THEY CAN. Or maybe because they think the items are mocking them. But I’m going with, BECAUSE THEY CAN and they know it will annoy you (or get them attention). Bear Cat knows EXACTLY what annoys me and goes out of his way to do those EXACT things. I joke that he has to do that to make up for him being such a sweetheart the rest of the time. Like, “Oh, if I destroy/annoy, then I’m still a cat even though I love snuggles and come when the human calls me.” 🙂
Great post! My Toffee loves to snuggle in a cardboard box, even if it’s way too small for her, or maybe it’s because it IS so small that she feels safer.
Boxes R Us for sure…we just love spaces like that.
I might need lots of boxes to hide in soon
Hugs madi your bfff
Yep, we love boxes. We love the security they give…plus they make great napping spots!
Wells, us kitties could of told those scientists that years ago!!! Boxes rule!
Luvs,
Rose ~ The adult kitten.
We love boxes….great snoozing spots and cool privacy places.
The Florida Furkids
Huh, this is very interesting. It seems cats like boxes the way dogs like crates/dens. They both provide a feeling of safety and security and thus one can rest at ease. Great post!
We are all big fans of boxes here, and as our humans really don’t care for going to the mall or stores, we have lots of boxes arriving all the time. Thanks for letting us know why! XOCK, Lily Olivia, Mauricio, Misty May, Giulietta, Fiona, Astrid, Lisbeth and Calista Jo
Most of us like boxes, unfortunately,, Penny likes to pee in them so they don’t last long.
guys !!! what a good study; may bee thiz yeer we will take sum card board
az well; down two R local shelter when we go in November…
we like boxes …..like we like R food….
sum times yez.~~~~~~~ sum times knot 🙂 ♥♥♥
We love boxes.
We have some fabric cubes that serve a similar purpose and they get lots of use
I’d rather sleep on the bed in the open but love boxes for playing in. Strangely enough the longer I see the same box, the less innerest I have in it. Cat Claws’ foundered perfected the cardboard scratching posts when they saw how much their kitties liked boxes. I wonder if cats that scratch them have less stress too.
I wish I could get Bear to use boxes. I made him a really cool cat cave with boxes and he won’t even acknowledge its existence. I keep thinking he’s missing out on some essential experience of cathood, but he doesn’t appear bothered. Then again, there was the time I got so frustrated I plopped down in a box hoping to teach him by example. Since it was a total impulse, I didn’t bother to compare the size of my behind to the size of the box. If Bear wasn’t afraid of boxes before, he is now! Though I suspect he was also laughing at me – like always 🙂
Aw, I loved learning the science behind cats and boxes! And it makes perfect sense, too. I’ve noticed that Truffles and now Mudpie prefer cat beds that are more closed in too, I’m sure for the same reasons!
We’ve never ever met a box we didn’t like!!!
The chubby Izzy always packs himself into Caroline’s special basket on the fridge (much to her chagrin). As for boxes, we don’t get many good ones to play in.
If the mom had had more time (and wasn’t working 60+ hours/week – for REALZ) she would have liked to have written about the updates Shroedinger’s Cat Physics!
(seriouslies, we need to change that to the particle releasing TUNA not a poison gas!!)
Great post! My to girls like boxes, but Dexter rarely goes in them.
The feral cats at my county shelter are provided feral dens which even for the largest cat give them a sense of security as they feel safe in this hidey den. TKS and I just like playing in boxes. We don’t like hang out in them
We love to play in boxes but we prefer to sleep under the blankies or under bushes. Purrs