The nation of Japan takes many things very seriously.
Such as their family honor, their sense of nobility, their Kit-Kat candy bars and their love for all things KFC.
But perhaps the two things The Land Of The Rising Sun take most seriously are public safety and cats.
Yellow Hat, Japan’s largest chain of auto parts and service centers, teamed up with Kyoto University’s Camp-Nyan animal psychology research team to create a public service traffic safety video. What is unique about this video is its targeted audience.
The video is not designed to assist the elderly or teach young children how to safely cross a busy street, but rather to teach cats how to safely cross a busy street.
Yes, the video is designed for and targeted towards cats!
Just to be clear, this was not a public safety video with a few pictures of household felines tossed in. The team brought in Professor Kazuo Fujita, a specialist in zoology and cognitive science, to design this video specifically engineered with “plenty of moving elements in order to command kitties’ attention.”
Similar care went into the audio components. The team tested a variety of candidates for the video’s “narrator” before deciding on the specific set of meows that cat test audiences responded to most attentively.
The background music contains the sound of chirping birds and wave sound patterns similar to the squeaking of mice and other small rodents. The aim being that cats are natural predators with hunter instincts that will kick in when they think they hear their preferred prey hiding somewhere onscreen and keep them watching the video.
Out of curiosity, I tried the video out with the Geeky Family’s two pet cats, Tibby and Taun Taun (we rescued her during a snowstorm) and had some interesting results!
Apparently it incited violent reactions from TaunTaun. But to be fair, many things incite violent reactions from her (including eating, breathing and merely existing). Truthfully, my cats are kinda dicks.
Will this video assist in improving feline safety and teach them to ignore those seductively warm man hole covers in the center lanes of the streets? Only time will tell…
Please play the video for your kitties and comment below with their reactions. I’d love to find out.
Pictures and portions of this article are courtesy of SoraNews24.com.
Geeky Daddy 
That is a really crazy video. Maybe a really smart cat would learn something.
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Wow, I tried playing the video for my cat and the dogs started going mental! Lol, everyone was looking for the noises except the cat who with a swish of her tail just walked off! Hilarious reactions though
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Wow, who knew..ha ha I love it! I am a huge cat fiend..and anything to help keep them safe- I’m all for it, thanks for sharing! Thanks for commenting on my Las Vegas post as well! Have a great day!
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Thanks! I’ll try to show it to my cat Pedro, let’s see how it goes….
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