Digital exhibits promote zoos and aquariums’ purpose to educate the public, contribute to species conservation, and provide entertainment. Based on recent survey results, approximately seventy-three percent of adults in the US believe in the existence of zoos and aquariums. Therefore, zoos and aquariums are not likely closing their businesses any time soon. Yet, conventional zoos and aquariums rely on captive animals to promote education, conservation awareness, and visitor entertainment, to the detriment of those animals. No matter the quality of a zoo or aquarium exhibit, a captive environment cannot replicate the experience of living in one’s natural home. Therefore, incorporation of digital zoos and aquariums could provide a balance between providing education and entertainment to visitors, while also promoting conservation and preserving the safety of live animals. Animals would no longer need to be kept in exhibits.
This article will discuss developments in, and subsequent impacts of, establishing digital exhibits in zoos and aquariums, specifically through Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR). Though AR and VR may still present animals in confinement and normalize artificial habitats, these technologies do signify a prioritization of preserving live animals’ health and safety. Furthermore, digital exhibits may represent participating zoos and aquariums’ belief that excluding live animals from exhibits is an important step toward truly preserving species’ survival and improving individual animals’ quality of life.
Zoos and aquariums use two primary forms of technology to showcase digital animal exhibits: AR and VR. These technologies have distinct functions, however, both types can create entirely digital exhibits that simulate different species in their natural habitats. Zoos and aquariums may refer to such an exhibit as a ‘hologram zoo.’ Fully digital exhibits can engage visitors in ways that live animal exhibits cannot. For instance, they allow visitors to walk through exhibits rather than being passive observers looking through glass or cages at animals.
VR is a “computer-generated simulation of a three-dimensional image or environment that can be interacted with in a seemingly real or physical way.” In other words, VR allows people to immerse themselves in panoramic images of animals in their natural habitat. VR may also incorporate computer-generated images (CGI), “where things may be realistic, but are created digitally.” VR enables visitors to witness a holistic perspective of animals exhibiting natural behaviors and daily routines.
AR “is a technology that overlays digital elements—such as images, videos, or sounds—onto the real world” through smart phones or specialized AR glasses. Therefore, AR is different from VR because it adds a supplemental layer to an exhibit, but may not function as an entire replacement. Like VR, AR allows visitors to see species exhibiting natural, species-specific behavior. Though AR may not be the best technology to create a completely digital or holographic zoo, it can add to VR exhibits or present exhibits in new ways that avoid using live animals.
Whether through VR or AR, some zoos and aquariums are transitioning their exhibits, and even entire locations, to become digital. Digital exhibits change the learning format and introduction of animals to visitors. The technology invites visitors to participate in animals’ simulated experiences as well as provide species-specific facts about conservation efforts and other educational content. VR and AR technology also allows zoos and aquariums to make their exhibits interdisciplinary by employing artists to design visual backgrounds, combining art and education.
VR and AR programs make exhibits accessible to broader audiences. They provide visitors with the ability to explore species and their natural habitats that visitors may not have had access to otherwise. Through digital platforms, visitors can observe animals without risking animals’ health, safety, and lives by importing them from other countries. Digital exhibits also support visitors with physical disabilities or impairments because exhibit infrastructure can focus on designs that accommodate human visitors, rather than melding perimeters of live animal exhibits with observation areas. Furthermore, digital exhibits may be able to increase zoos and aquariums’ entertainment abilities because they continuously show active animals, compared to exhibits with live animals who have sleeping schedules or who may not always be visible.
Digital exhibits can promote species conservation by leaving animals in their natural habitats. Zoos and aquariums can prevent poaching because they no longer create demands for certain species whose members may not have been born in, and available through, captivity. By ending the demand for captured wildlife, zoos and aquariums also prevent captured animals’ injury, pain, suffering, and death during shipment. Furthermore, digital exhibits protect animals from developing zoochosis, which is associated with chronic stress and development of stereotypic behaviors during captivity, conditions that are deleterious to animals’ physical and mental health.
Digital zoos and aquariums also prevent captive animals and human visitors from dangerous encounters with each other, which ultimately protects animals. Visitors can explore animals’ environments and observe the impressiveness of different species, without worrying about injuries through physical contact. Digital exhibits can safely illustrate the reasons wild animals and humans should not be forced into close proximity with each other. By ceasing to exhibit live animals, zoos and aquariums model humane approaches toward human-animal interactions.
The end of live animal exhibits ameliorates concerns surrounding compliance with, and enforcement of, the Animal Welfare Act, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums’ (AZA) requirements, state animal anti-cruelty laws (as applicable to a zoo or aquarium’s respective jurisdiction), and the Convention on International Trade and Endangered Species’ requirements (as relevant to each species). Zoos and aquariums would need to comply with these laws and regulating bodies for exhibits that still showcase live animals. However, each completely digital exhibit ends the requirement to satisfy these governing entities’ standards because live animals would not be present and in need of legal protection.
Zoos and aquariums must cover the expenses of creating and maintaining digital exhibits. But, they save money on costs of care (food, water, mental stimulation, veterinary expenses, etc.) for live animals; maintaining and updating animals’ enclosures to ensure AZA compliance; and expenses related to designing enclosures for species that are new to the organization.
Technology created for one organization can be shared and duplicated for other organizations. This sharing strategy means that costs to develop and establish digital exhibits can become more affordable; and development and implementation can become streamlined and systematic, even with exhibit customizations. The shareability of these technologies also makes digital exhibits more appealing to organizations that are determining whether such an exhibit would benefit their audience and business plan. The success and feasible duplication of another organization’s digital exhibit enables curious organizations to adopt successful exhibits efficiently without committing to costly investments.
Creating wholly digital animal exhibits safely educates humans about animals, without inducing stress and stress-related behaviors onto animals kept in cages, confined spaces, or other artificial environments or communities in which they would not naturally exist. Digital exhibits can connect humans to animals and exotic places, but in a way that is humane and sustainable.
The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Animal Legal Defense Fund or any client. This article is published for informational purposes only and is not legal advice.
