The Visitor Effect on Zoo Animals: Implications and Opportunities for Zoo Animal Welfare

Abstract

Achieving and maintaining high standards of animal welfare is critical to the success of a modern zoo. Research has shown that an animal’s welfare is highly dependent on how various individual animal factors (e.g., species traits, genetics, temperament and previous experience) interact with environmental features (e.g., social grouping, enclosure design and sensory environment). One prominent feature of the zoo environment is the presence of visitors. Visitor contact can be unpredictable and intense, particularly in terms of auditory and visual interaction. Depending on an animal’s perception of this interaction, visitors can have either negative, neutral or positive impacts on zoo animal behaviour and welfare. This paper reviews the literature on the implications and potential opportunities of human-zoo animal interactions on animal behaviour and welfare, with the aim of stimulating interest, understanding and exploration of this important subject. The literature to date presents a mixed range of findings on the topic. It is possible this variation in the responses of zoo animals to visitors may be due to species-specific differences, the nature and intensity of the visitor interactions, enclosure design, and individual animal characteristics. Analysing these studies and better understanding animal preferences and motivations can provide insight into what animals find negatively and positively reinforcing in terms of visitor contact in a specific zoo setting. This understanding can then be applied to either safeguard welfare in cases where visitors can have a negative impact, or, conversely, it can be applied to highlight opportunities to encourage animal-visitor interaction in situations where animals experience positive emotions associated with visitor interaction.

Influence of environmental enrichment on the behavior of captive Ateles paniscus (Primates: Atelidae) in the Parque Zoobotânico Getúlio Vargas, Salvador, Bahia, Brazil

“…It is possible that the presence of visitors exerted a negative effect on the behavior of captive A. paniscus in the PZGV since when visitation stopped or became reduced, the behaviors also stopped (personal observation). This situation has been previously reported in other studies, which observed a negative influence of zoo visitors on captive animals, mainly primates (CHAMOVE et al, 1988;SADE, 2013;SHERWEN;HEMSWORTH, 2019). We emphasize that studies considering this possible interference is necessary in the PZGV.…”

Development and Implementation of Baseline Welfare Assessment Protocol for Captive Breeding of Wild Ungulate—Punjab Urial (Ovis vignei punjabiensis, Lydekker 1913)

“…With the exception of CU1, where animals were observed to be moving back and forth and the enclosure is located in close proximity to local settlements and roads, so stereotypic behavior was recorded during the application of the current protocol. According to [49], eye contact of visitors and wild animals in captivity can result in stress and stereotypic behavior. Following [34], fences at CUI should be covered with raffia in order to avoid frequent eye contact between the animals and the public.…”

Effect of Covering a Visitor Viewing Area Window on the Behaviour of Zoo-Housed Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)

“…Research on the effect of visitors on zoo animals has expanded significantly in the past several years, providing increasing evidence of the various effects visitors can have on a range of zoo species [1]. However, the literature presents mixed findings, possibly because of a number of factors that may affect the response of zoo animals to visitors such as species-specific differences, individual animal characteristics, enclosure design and the nature and intensity of visitor-animal interactions [1,2]. As a result, the manner in which visitors affect zoo animals still remains unclear for many species, especially for a rarely studied taxa such as penguins [3].…”

“…As a result, the manner in which visitors affect zoo animals still remains unclear for many species, especially for a rarely studied taxa such as penguins [3]. Understanding the way visitors affect zoo animals is important because visitor contact can be unpredictable and intense, with zoo animals being exposed to a range of stimuli from visitors including auditory, visual, tactile, olfactory and vibratory stimuli [1,4]. These visitor stimuli may be perceived by zoo animals as, for example threatening or stimulating, and so understanding this can help identify characteristics of visitors, animals and/or enclosures that affect the nature of visitor contact and be subsequently managed accordingly by zoos [1,3].…”