Deadly? The research claims cats have similar personality traits to bigger predators
New research claims that despite looking cute and harmless, the sparkle in your beloved cat's eyes might is probably their killer instinct.
Researchers from the University of Edinburgh looked at the character traits of domestic pet cats and compared how similar their behaviour is to wildcats and big cats such as lions.
The study found that the different breeds had the same strong characteristics related to dominance, impulsiveness and neuroticism.
Compared with the snow leopard, the Scottish wildcat and the African lion, researchers found larger predators shared similar characteristics of aggression and neurotic behaviour to domestic cats.
And if the average domestic cat were any bigger, it too would probably try to kill you.
The cats were rated on the 'Big Five' human personality traits, using a scale of one to five.
These traits were: Openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion/introversion, agreeableness and neuroticism.
But the researchers, in cooperation with the Bronx Zoo, also rated cats on personality traits such as playfulness - and it's not all bad news.
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