How Can I Make My Kitten Nice and Playful?

When you adopt a kitten, you need to provide a stress-free, stable and loving environment for it to thrive in. By properly training and socializing your kitten, it will grow into a loving, playful and nice cat. If your kitten behaves in a withdrawn or aggressive way, you can take steps to train it to play nicely and enjoy the company of people. Positively reinforce the behavior you desire from your kitten and provide it with appropriate outlets for its energy and natural instincts to keep you and your kitten happy and well-adjusted.

Things You'll Need

  • Cat bed
  • Litter box
  • Food and water dishes
  • Cat treats
  • Cat toys
  • Laser cat toy
  • Meat baby food
  • Cooked chicken
  • Scratching post
  • Synthetic cat pheromone spray
  • Synthetic cat pheromone diffuser
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Instructions

    • 1

      Provide your kitten with its own space, giving it a comfortable cat bed to sleep on, its own litter box, food and water dishes. If you have other pets in the home, you need to slowly introduce them to the kitten by allowing both the kitten and the other pets to smell each other's scent. Initially keep the introductions short, to reduce stress on all of the animals involved and ensure your kitten feels secure. This will reduce any stress-induced behaviors such as aggression or inappropriate elimination. Reward good behavior between the animals with a cat treat and verbal praise.

    • 2

      Give your kitten some cat toys to play with so it learns to play properly. Kittens learn most of their socialization behaviors between the ages of 3 to 7 weeks, according to WebMD. Engage the kitten in interactive playing sessions using cat toys on a string or laser cat toys to get the kitten's attention and tempt them to play with you. Reward playful behavior with verbal praise and cat treats to encourage this outgoing, friendly demeanor.

    • 3

      Handle your kitten gently and often so it gets used to human interaction and companionship. When your kitten snuggles and purrs with you, reward its behavior with a small piece of cooked chicken, a cat treat, or some meat-based human baby food. This positively rewards its behavior and makes it associate human interaction with something good.

    • 4

      Give your kitten a scratching post so it has an outlet for its natural scratching behavior and learns from an early age where it can acceptably scratch. This prevents any destructive behaviors later in life, so it will not scratch furniture or other unacceptable surfaces, keeping it well-behaved.

    • 5

      Pet and play with your kitten regularly, but train it not to behave aggressively with you, especially when it comes to biting. If your kitten bites your hand while playing or handling it, immediately say "ouch" and walk away to ignore it. This trains your kitten that biting will lead to a stop in play or companionship, discouraging the behavior. When your kitten does not bite, you can also give it a food reward to encourage positive interactions.

    • 6

      Spray a synthetic pheromone around the areas your kitten frequents or plug in a diffuser containing cat-appeasing pheromones. These chemicals mimic the positive, facial pheromones of cats, promoting a sense of safety and well-being for your kitten. This will keep it well-behaved and nice in your presence, and encourage positive interactions between you and with other pets in the home.