My boy, Babbage, is generally very relaxed and the top cat around the house, he is always keen for play and cuddles and struts around the place like he owns it.

However, when the doorbell rings Babbage is off like a shot - generally under my bed if possible. I think this has to do with the young lad of friends of mine. The lad is coming up to 4 years old and is, as you can imagine, boisterous, loud and prone to running around as a young lad should. He is good with cats- he grew up with one, but a little tempted to run towards the cats to play with them whereas they would be happier to keep him under observation for a year or two before committing themselves to being relaxed in his presence. In recent visits I have been teaching him to keep a little distance from Ada - my other cat, and extend his arm/finger so that she can get a good sniff of him without feeling threatened. He was really good with this, as was she- she licked his fingers. An excellent result.

Babbage, however hid for the duration of their visit. They came for dinner and I was so busy that it didn't occur to me that he had never shown his face in a period of several hours. This weekend the doorbell rang on Saturday evening and he shot off under my bed and only came out when it turned out that I was having a pizza delivered.

What can I do to change the Pavlovian response that he seems to have to the doorbell. Is it worth ringing the bell and then treating him ? Is there something else that I can try ? I think I also need to get my friends round with their son and spend time with Babbage whilst they are in another room playing with him and acting relaxed and calm - again is there anything else that I need to think about doing ?

All that comes up in my mind is to help Your cat to associate Your friends with positive things..... maybe put some food (why not his favourite?) on the bowl after the doorbell rings, and also I would ask to Your friend to play with Your cats (You know....feathers, fake bugs, aluminium foils' balls etc....)
I leave the word to the experts ;)

My Quasar behaves much the same as your Babbage. When we (hubby, puppy, Quasar, and I) are home, Quasar is cock of the walk. He owns this place, all 4100 sq feet and 3 stories of it! When we travel, he owns our truck, our tent, and pretty much any other space we occupy together.

When visitors come, he is aloof, until he has a chance to monitor them safely from a distance. If they approach him, or make too much noise on entry to the house, he runs to hide under our bed.

I brag about him to friends but, when they come to visit, they see a frightened scaredy-cat.

Quasar has been exposed to just about everything since we got him at 13 weeks of age. He definitely prefers small people over large and lets kids handle him without any hassles. Big people seem to be intimidating, especially when they approach him like he is going to be a huge warm cuddly ball of fur.

We have just learned to accept him as he is. This is his personality. If people take the time to let him get to know them, they find a different sort of cat. Most people aren't here regularly enough, nor do they have the patience to accomplish this. That's not my problem, or Quasar's.

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~ Kyenta

It's a tough one. Click and treats is an excellent idea, except that it needs to be simultaneous, and if he first dashes under the bed, and you have to go and hunt for him to get him out or reassure him, the moment has already passed. Unless perhaps you could have your cat, safely in the room where he goes to hide, with the door closed, feeling safe, and THEN have someone ring the bell and do your click and treat. Worth a try!

Perhaps you could counter-condition him by you yourself ringing the doorbell when you come home. You could also try something like changing the doorbell chime. Play it by ear though, I mean if it really causes her a ton of trauma then you might have to re-think it.

When/if you could ever get him face-to-face with the child, of course then, it's treats and his favorite form of play. It's got to be a "jackpot" type of moment.

I have a scardy-cat too, Neytiri, but maybe not quite as scared as yours. I have a friend who comes over now and again, and everytime she does, Neytiri runs and hides, like you describe. In her case it was running up the stairs and hiding out in my bedroom. My friend desperately wanted to be friends with Neytiri, and Neytiri is such a cuddly, affectionate cat that I knew that if I could ever "help things along" that it would be wonderful for both of them. I first tried things like carrying Neytiri downstairs, slowly, giving her lots of reassurance. That just got me scratched up, and Neytiri traumatized. Bad idea. After a few visits, where nothing traumatic happened for Neytiri, she started getting a little bit curious, she would come out of the bedroom and hang out at the top of the stairs. My friend would come and quietly sit at the bottom of the stairs, tossing and dragging Neytiri's favorite toy: a long strand of kitted wool (ironically one that she made her). The first visit: nothing, Neytiri just stared down suspiciously at her, and any movement towards her caused her to take off. Next visit, Neytiri same thing, except she ventured down a few steps, nervously. Eventually we got her so that she would bat at the toy a little bit, keeping a few steps between her and my friend. The last visit, she played more and was feeling more confident, and when my friend went and sat on the couch, Neytiri eventually followed her down there. She was still really nervous, and looking for reasons to bolt back upstairs, but my friend kept still, let Neytiri come to her, and when she did: treats, and soft voice encouragement, Eventually Neytiri decided that she was ok, and started rubbing up against her and accepting pets... then more pets, then lots of pets, then sitting in her lap, and demanding pets

It worked out really well eventually, but it sure was slow progress getting there. At various points my friend actually got quite discouraged thinking that "Neytiri hated her" etc. It went from "not terrified" to "best friends" pretty quickly, the hard part was going from "terrified" to "not terrified".

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The little monsters 3

I'm going off in a different direction here. A cat's sense of hearing is much more advanced and it could be the tone of the doorbell irritates his ears. You know how they say dogs can hear things we can't? Same with cats. He may not like the doorbell sound and it has nothing to do with kids, although when children are loud and boisterous, cats do tend to hide away until it passes. The only thing you can do is to have the child be calm and still and pet the cat while you're holding the kitty. And just for a few seconds, then move the cat away.

Sherry - I don't think it is the bell itself, because he hid all the time that the young lad was at my place. Ada, in contrast, did come and see what was going on, even if she kept a wary distance.

Brian - Ringing the doorbell as I come home is a very good idea. I'm going to talk through the door first so that he knows it is me, then ring the bell and open the door.

I think it's the upset of their ideal bubble world with just exposure to their family. I used to live in a condo and the guard would call before someone came to the door. The cat I had then would run and hide when the phone rang because usually a visitor appeared at the door shortly after. She was a real scaredy cat.

Mine aren't keen on the doorbell either although they've improved since we had the porch done and now we use the front door instead of coming round the back. Hendrix is the worst and will always run and hide but jagger will usually come to investigate eventually if someone has come in.

Before we started coming through the front door though they seemed to think anyone coming in the front was a stranger and therefore scary, and anyone coming in the back was a friend.

I think Brian's suggestion of ringing the door bell when you come home should improve things, will probably give it a go myself. They used to run off when we came through the front door so I always talk to them through the door when I get home and that in itself improved matters.

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Clare
Hendrix and Jagger, Brown Marble Boys (born 18 August 2013)
Hampshire, UK

A little update - I've been ringing the doorbell each evening when I come in from work and Babbage seems quite relaxed about it now - a great result.

Thanks to all who offered help.