Final answer:
Juan's cat is experiencing instinctive drift, a phenomenon where an animal's innate behaviors override taught behaviors, such as fetching a ball. Cats have a natural instinct to chase, which aligns with their hunting behaviors, making it difficult to train them to perform actions that counter their instincts.
Step-by-step explanation:
The difficulties Juan's cat has with fetching a ball but not with jumping through a hoop can be attributed to the concept of instinctive drift. This occurs when an animal's innate behaviors interfere with behaviors being taught. Cats, being natural-born hunters, have a strong instinct to chase objects such as prey, which is why the cat would chase the ball. However, the behavior of fetching and bringing the ball back does not align with the cat's instinctual hunting behaviors, making it more challenging to train the cat to perform tasks that go against its innate tendencies.
Innate behaviors, such as hunting in cats, do not require learning and are naturally occurring. They are responses to stimuli that can be more complex, like hunting, or simpler, like reflex actions. For example, kittens pounce on toys and chase each other as a form of play which helps them learn how to hunt. This type of play is a manifestation of their innate predatory instincts, which do not need to be explicitly taught by the mother or other cats.