The way humans deal with their animal environment is a complex, changeable structure, consisting of social and economic action, philosophical and scientific discourses, as well as social conflicts and the structure of social classes.1 What is inconsistent here is how humans encounter animals, both in the collective as well as in the individual frame of reference. The way we think about animals and how we encounter them can take many forms. From the one extreme of a personified pet, whose owner spares no expense and effort to offer it a full and long life, to an anonymous farm animal whose pain and death is accepted for the consumption of meat products. How concretely an animal species or an animal individual is dealt with and how this interaction can change in the shortest possible time is a product of cultural, socio-structural and individual influencing variables. The consideration of the human-animal dualism and its exact facets is therefore important, since the way we collectively deal with different animal species can say a lot about who we are, how we see ourselves and what is important to us. In order to come to this conclusion, however, it is necessary to look more closely at the factors influencing the way we interact and how the relationship to different animal species then changed in concrete terms. socio-structural and individual influencing variables. The consideration of the human-animal dualism and its exact facets is therefore important, since the way we collectively deal with different animal species can say a lot about who we are, how we see ourselves and what is important to us. In order to come to this conclusion, however, it is necessary to look more closely at the factors influencing the way we interact and how the relationship to different animal species then changed in concrete terms. socio-structural and individual influencing variables. The consideration of the human-animal dualism and its exact facets is therefore important, since the way we collectively deal with different animal species can say a lot about who we are, how we see ourselves and what is important to us. In order to come to this conclusion, however, it is necessary to look more closely at the factors influencing the way we interact and how the relationship to different animal species then changed in concrete terms.
In the present master's thesis, a section of this ambivalent area is to be examined in more detail with regard to its development within the period between 2000 and 2012 in connection with the consideration of possible social influences. The focus is on how the handling of the very animals changed with which we humans voluntarily spend our free time.