Meowing - Blog Posts
The idea that housecats are baby-talking at humans when they meow is based on a misunderstanding.
Yes, it’s true that, amongst themselves, adult housecats generally only vocalise to communicate with kittens, but the particular set of vocalisations that adult cats use to communicate with humans is distinct from, and largely non-overlapping with, the set of vocalisations that they use to communicate with kittens.
Your average adult housecat has anywhere from twenty to fifty distinct vocalisations that are basically only used to communicate with humans.
Cats meowing at humans is less baby-talk and more your cat learning a whole second language.
I live in a neighborhood where there are many cats, so it's not unusual to hear them fighting or just meowing at night. I've recently, for some reason, started to just meow back when they meow at night.