Abstract
Virtual Reality (VR) is now a popular tool in education and for engagement with the natural world, but to date little research has investigated its potential in a zoo setting. We aimed to gauge the interest of the visiting public in using VR technology at Royal Zoological Society of Scotland’s (RZSS) Edinburgh Zoo. A VR (n = 12) and a video condition (n = 12), both introducing the lives and conservation concerns of African wild dogs (Lycaon pictus), were used to gain greater insight of the thoughts and perceptions of how individuals evaluated a purpose-built VR experience and to enable comparisons of learning outcomes for both technologies. We used semi-structured interviews; responses were evaluated through thematic analysis and descriptive analysis. Younger participants (aged 13-18 years) emphasized that VR allowed them close and personal access to the animals. Adult participants (aged 19 and above) pointed out the entertainment value of the VR experience while highlighting the potential of its educational aspect; that of enabling visitors to see animals in their natural habitat. While our results require further confirmation due to the limited sample size and restricted circumstances of data collection, we suggest that VR could be usefully introduced as a public education and visitor engagement tool that would benefit the visitors’ learning and overall experience at the zoo.
Highlights
Virtual Reality (VR) is a popular tool in education and for engagement with the natural world, but to date little research has investigated its potential in a zoo setting
There are many applications to VR; it can be used to teach pupils molecular biology when it is essential that students visualize the material in three dimensions (Tan & Waugh, 2013); it has been used for decades to teach medical students skills such as keyhole surgery (Ota et al, 1995)
African wild dogs were chosen as subjects as, during project planning, there was a small wild dog pack at Edinburgh Zoo and the company that created the VR experience (Reality Garage) had access to film of wild dogs living in a reserve in South Africa
Summary
Virtual Reality (VR) is a popular tool in education and for engagement with the natural world, but to date little research has investigated its potential in a zoo setting. The majority of zoos worldwide provide experiences that allow visitors to have close encounters with animals (e.g., petting or feeding animals, and drive or walk-through exhibits; D’Cruze et al, 2019), which are potential sources of additional income for the zoo and simultaneously provide a profound experience to the visitor (Luebke & Matiasek, 2013). VR was shown to engage the parts of the brain responsible for critical thinking; these same parts of the brain were activated during hands-on activities (Lamb et al, 2018) These studies suggest that VR has the potential to create naturalistic environments that can facilitate learning, actions and attitudes similar to those resulting from hands-on activities and experiences
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