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I was wondering about this. I think dogs and cats do, and I think ants and spiders don't, but what about other animals? Is it a pleasure only mammals get? I've seen videos about parrots getting stroked and they looked happy (even though, of course, I don't know their real feelings), and parrots are birds. Why do some animals like it and some don't? It may sound really stupid and childish, but it makes me wonder.
Animals who like contact tend to be denning animals who are born in mass and raised for the first few weeks in contact with warm bodies.
Of course the bigger issue is that many of those are wild animals and not too fond of humans. Wild animals act like wild animals even if they are human friendly when very young, they grow out of it.
The above mentioned horse are not denning animals and they like to be brushed and scratched. I don't think it is so much that they love to be petted as it is that they are itchy. They've been bred for many centuries to tolerate handling by humans.
With many animals they are tolerating it and not enjoying it and it is the human who is really enjoying it.
Horses don't particularly care for gentle stroking. They prefer firm strokes like OWS said..brushing. And patting. Gentle stroking makes them twitchy...like flies are on their coats.
When I was young we used to catch lizards for a pet store. Sometimes we would encounter several, but we wouldn't have a container to hold them. We found that, if we stroked the belly of a lizard and laid it on its back, it would be incapacitated long enough for us to catch another. Sometimes we'd have four lizards lying on their backs at a time. The scenario was like trying to keep a bunch of plates spinning, eventually we'd have too many to keep them all incapacitated.
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