A universal aspect of diminutives is their pragmatic use for softening a speech act. This function is not strictly limited to morphological diminutives but in principle works for any linguistic element that conveys a notion of ‘smallness.’ A straightforward example is when a person asks for a favour of some kind: the chance that the request will be granted increases if the favour is presented as insignificant. Diminutives are frequent in situations with children, in the language of love and in speech directed to pets, and more generally, in situations exhibiting the features ‘non serious’, ‘empathy’, ‘sympathy’, ‘familiarity’ or ‘intimacy’. With the diminutive we express our affection or contempt. When it is suggested that women use diminutives more often than men, social factors are mentioned as an explanation: women are considered to be more contact-oriented than men, to select friends on the basis of personal experience, and to attach only secondary importance to motives such as status or professional interest.