why-animals-do-the-thing:

world-cat:

What a cute face! 

Just a reminder, though: Do not wrestle with your cats or let them use your hands as toys! This creates a cycle of behavior where the cat learns that it’s OK to bite and scratch you in certain situations, and then later you wonder why they attack “just out of nowhere”–it’s because they think you’re still playing.

A lot of cats might have been raised without other kittens around to play with. In this situation they don’t learn proper bite inhibition, because they had no other cat to go all “bro what was that, we were just playing” if they bite or scratch too hard. This means that humans have to teach them, and if you’re letting your cat attack you in ways that would be unacceptable to another cat (or to you when it’s not expected), it’s very confusing for them. 

If your cat does bite or scratch, be really melodramatic about it–draw back, say “owwww,” all the rest. Just don’t fight back. Cats don’t understand punishment. Ending the play session with your cat when they attack will tell them clearly enough that they broke the rules of play fighting.

A bird toy (like this) is really the best thing for simulating the hunting behavior that cats want to express during play. It keeps your cat from associating you with prey, and unlike a laser, it gives a satisfying object to catch.

Now, go out and have some fun with your cats. 🙂

Sources:

CAT MOJO: How to Stop Your Cat From Attacking Your Ankles

How to Train a Cat to Stop Biting

why-animals-do-the-thing, if you have anything to add I’d like to hear it!

This is pretty accurate. What you encourage your pets to do when they interact with you is what they’re going to learn is acceptable behavior. This is why we teach ‘tug’ as a specific game rather than letting our pets pull on anything we happen to be holding whenever the feel like it. So if you want to let your cats attack you, sure, but then you’ve got to be okay with it when they chase your feet and bite your toes and all those other predatory behaviors you’ve allowed.

I only know the efficacy of yelping and ending play with dogs – it teaches bite inhibition in the same way that a litter-mate would, by taking the fun playtime away when the’re too rough – but I would say that yeah, you can safely generalize that to cats. 

Toys are the best for cats. All cats should have a couple of different types of toys so they can engage in all their natural behaviors while indoors – it’s fun for you and the cat, and prevents the destruction of native wildlife as a bonus.