Cats groom each other to claim sun spots, not just to bond, study finds

Cats are supposed to be chill. Or at least that’s the stereotype: standoffish, independent, mildly mysterious. But a new study published in the journal Applied Animal Behavior Science adds a spicy wrinkle to the “cats are nice” narrative. Sometimes, cats groom each other for reasons that look a lot less like friendship and a lot more like getting someone else out of your way.

The finding is simple to state and a little hard to undo: mutual grooming, known as allogrooming, is widespread in the animal kingdom, and in cats it has often been categorized as affiliative, or “friendly,” cat behavior. The new research says that categorization may miss what is happening on the ground. In observations described by the study’s lead author, Morgane Van Belle, one cat would groom another in a way that was “not super friendly,” and the interaction would get the licked cat to move off, forfeiting a sunny spot.

To understand why this matters, you have to start with what grooming is usually believed to do. Mutual grooming in animals is typically focused on body parts that an animal can’t reach easily on its own, like the back and neck. That makes it sound cooperative by design: the grooming becomes a kind of kindness that also supports social bonding. And cats are not the only ones doing it. The source notes allogrooming is found in primates, birds, horses, and even insects, with examples like primates picking lice from each other’s backs.

So why would cats ever use that same behavior to act annoying? The study frames the grooming as potentially a method of subtle torment. That phrase matters because it suggests a specific function, not just a coincidence. Van Belle’s observation is the core “wait a second” moment. She was watching her own cats, Fabio and Giovanni, interacting over a favorite napping spot. She noticed grooming patterns that she thought did not look friendly. Instead, she described a recurring setup: one cat would lie on the blanket near the window, then the other cat would come up and start licking it, but “in an annoying way.” The licked cat would then get up and forfeit the sunny spot.

This is not presented as cats suddenly becoming villains. It’s presented as scientists reconsidering how to interpret the behavior. Noema Gajdos Kmecova, a cat behavioral scientist at Ghent University and an author of the study, is quoted in the source explaining that, so far, mutual grooming in cats had been categorized as affiliative, or “friendly.” That’s the baseline. The new work is the evidence that the baseline might be too clean. If mutual grooming can sometimes be used to interfere with another cat’s access to a resource, then the “grooming equals bonding” shortcut is less reliable than it sounds.

There’s also a broader lesson for anyone who builds systems around animal behavior, whether that’s research labs, animal welfare programs, or commercial pet care. A behavior label is not just vocabulary. It shapes what people expect to see and how they respond. If an observer assumes grooming is always prosocial, they might miss an emerging pattern of harassment or competition. And if welfare decisions or training approaches are built on those assumptions, the second-order effects could be real: environments might be arranged to encourage “bonding” behaviors that are actually being used to squeeze others out.

While the source does not get into regulatory specifics, the logic still maps onto the modern policy world. Animal welfare and research practices increasingly rely on behavioral interpretation to decide what is normal, what is stressful, and what needs intervention. In that context, a study in Applied Animal Behavior Science is more than trivia. It signals that researchers may need to revise how they code and interpret interactions. That can cascade into better experimental design, more accurate assessments of social dynamics, and fewer “friendly” misreads when a cat is actually making a move.

The strategic stakes for executives and decision-makers are indirect but not imaginary. In labs and welfare organizations, behavior studies influence protocols, staffing choices, and resource allocation. In pet product companies, they inform features and marketing claims. And in any organization that deals with behavioral outcomes, misclassification is an operational risk. This study is a reminder that even seemingly innocent behaviors can have competing incentives, and that the “friendly” interpretation may sometimes be a convenient story that animals do not follow.

In other words: the next time someone tells you cats are just being nice when they groom, there may be more going on than bonding. Sometimes grooming is a tool, and the tool is pointed at the moment where another cat wants the sun.