‘There Is Not a Word’, but Is It Necessary? Analyzing Pragmatic Decisions Regarding Terminology Within Multispecies Family Relationships

This study analyzes the decision making that underlies the choice of terms we use to refer to companion animals. Three focus groups were developed, including participants from different demographic backgrounds who answered questions about their experience cohabitating with companion animals. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed using Thematic Analysis, carrying out a progressive refinement of the semantic contents until abstracting general themes. This study organizes the results based on three themes: (1) <i>What you mean to me</i>, contemplating human-animal relationships such as multispecies family, pet-owner relationship, human-like relationship, and objectivization; (2) <i>Others' surveillance</i>, encompassing the role of social pressure in decision making; and (3) <i>A good solution (here and now)</i>, focused on the strategic decisions made to balance the prior questions. The analysis shows that companion animals are usually considered part of the family, but that importance is not always freely communicated outside of the household. Often, participants try to nuance the importance of their companion animals, mask this relationship behind jokes, or tend to isolate themselves to avoid hostile social attention. These findings show the dilemmas faced by people who live with animals and point to the urgency of revising hegemonic discourses to improve the integration of these new family models in Spanish society.