It’s easy to assume your cat doesn’t care about you. They present as fiercely independent, but it’s all a lie. They depend on your guidance, leadership, and knowledge of how to open the cabinet to get their food. According to science, under that stoic, bread-loaf exterior lies a chemical dependency: you and your cat are tripping on oxytocin together.

Not to be confused with OxyContin, the highly addictive opioid, Oxytocin is the so-called “love hormone.” It gets released when someone hugs you, cradles you in their loving arms, or provides any kind of physical affection.

Writing in The Conversation, Senior lecturer in Neurosciences and Neurorehabilitation at the College of Health and Life Sciences at London South Bank University, Laura Elin Pigott, says your brain also fires off oxytocin

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