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Phoenix666 [soylentnews.org] writes:

Your cat may love you, but it may not need you [csmonitor.com].

That’s according to a new study by animal behavior specialists at England's University of Lincoln, which confirms the old trope about our feline friends: that unlike dogs, which perceive their owners as a safe base, adult cats don’t necessarily rely on others to provide a sense of protection.
...
Felines, however, displayed little obvious distress when separated from their owners, the Lincoln researchers found. They observed the relationships between 20 cat-human pairs, noting the amount of contact sought by the cat, the level of passive behavior, and signs of distress caused by the absence of the owner.

“Although our cats were more vocal when the owner rather than the stranger left ... we didn’t see any additional evidence to suggest that the bond between a cat and its owner is one of secure attachment,” Mills said. The vocalization could simply be a sign of frustration or learned response, since the cats did not consistently display other signs of attachment.

Using the same technique to induce separation anxiety, dogs reacted similarly to infants.

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