94 Chapter 6● Avoidance behaviours:
● Hiding: acute stress can cause short episodes of hiding from stressors such as
unusual very loud noises, etc. but a chronically highly stressed house cat may
spend most of its time hiding.
● Fleeing: as with hiding, most cats will run from the things that frightened it;
however, a cat subjected to chronic stress is more likely to experience increased
arousal and exhibit more frequent or exaggerated responses, and therefore be
more likely to try to escape from an increased number of different stimuli.
● Feigned, sham or defensive sleeping: pretending to sleep or ‘forced’ unrelaxed
sleep is a strategy that some cats use to avoid interactions with perceived or
anticipated stressors (Kessler and Turner, 1997; Rochlitz et al., 1998; Casey
and Bradshaw, 2007).
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