Cat to Woman: Meow Cat to Guy: Meow, Meow, Meow

It's one of the stranger findings in a while when it comes to cats: Researchers suggest they may have to meow more if a man takes care of them instead of a woman. As the New York Times reports, their theory is that cats have essentially realized that guys aren't great listeners. Or as the study in the journal Ethology puts it in science-speak: Men "require more explicit vocalizations to notice and respond to the needs of their cats."

For the experiment out of Bilkent University in Turkey, 31 volunteers allowed the researchers to document their interactions with their cats upon returning home. They found that cats greeted male caregivers with an average of 4.3 meows in the first 100 seconds, compared to just 1.8 meows for women. In general, the women talked to their cats more, or mimicked their meows, and appeared to be "more skilled at interpreting feline vocalizations." The researchers acknowledge that the sample size is too small to draw general conclusions, but they hope it lays the groundwork for bigger studies.