Dogs are known as human’s best friend for its intelligence and faithfulness but cats were always underrated compared to dogs. But, new studies have changed the conventional thoughts about cats. Japanese scientists proved that cats are almost similar with dogs in terms of memory so it suggests that cats are as smart as dogs.

A group of Japanese scientists from Kyoto University led by Dr. Saho Takagi started an experiment on cats. She gathered 49 domestic cats for the study. Cats belong to the Felidae family and research shows that felines have the ability to recall the pleasant memories. They first published their findings in the journal of Behavioural Processes.

These kinds of memories are known as ‘Episodic memory’ which helps humans to recall the memory of pleasant experiences or memorable events of life’s like the first day of school, first day of job or best friend’s wedding. Same kind of memory could be found on both cats and dogs, using this kind of memory they can easily recognize their favorite snacks,what they ate for breakfast.

Dr. Takagi said in a statement,"Episodic memory is viewed as being related to the introspective function of the mind; our study may imply a type of consciousness in cats”. According to BBC News, researchers took those 49 cats and let them remember the bowl of food which they had eaten along with the bowls that they didn’t even touch with 15 minutes of interval. Using these study researchers were able to find that cats can easily remember the ‘What’ and ‘Where’ information about the bowl which suggests that they have good episodic memory.

Not only memory test, Takagi and her team also performed several mental tests on both species and most of those were matched, which includes response to human gestures, facial expressions, and emotions. The study also suggests that cats have a long term memory which was never believed before. She also explained that understanding cat’s mentality will help them to establish a better relationship between cats and humans. Before this research, a research team from Hungary tested some mental test on dogs and found that dogs are able to remember their owner's actions, even if sometimes they were not specifically instructed to do so.

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