Terry L. Maple

Advancing Behavior Analysis in Zoos and Aquariums

Zoos, aquariums, and other captive animal facilities offer promising opportunities to advance the science and practice of behavior analysis. Zoos and aquariums are necessarily concerned with the health and well-being of their charges and are held to a high standard by their supporters (visitors, members, and donors), organized critics, and the media. Zoos and aquariums offer unique venues for teaching and research and a locus for expanding the footprint of behavior analysis. In North America, Europe, and the UK, formal agreements between zoos, aquariums, and university graduate departments have been operating successfully for decades. To expand on this model, it will be necessary to help zoo and aquarium managers throughout the world to recognize the value of behavior analysis in the delivery of essential animal health and welfare services. Academic institutions, administrators, and invested faculty should consider the utility of training students to meet the growing needs of applied behavior analysis in zoos and aquariums and other animal facilities such as primate research centers, sanctuaries, and rescue centers.

Wellness as Welfare

While conservation and education are the main pillars of successful zoos, a growing emphasis on science and animal welfare is the next frontier of excellence. Nested in animal welfare, veterinary medicine, and behavioral science, the philosophy and practice of wellness is a new concept for zoos preparing for national leadership in the domain of animal welfare. The construct of wellness is understood as “a balance of mind, body, and spirit that results in an overall feeling of well-being.” This definition finds expression in the constant, conscious human pursuit of living life to its fullest potential. In nature, animals keep fit to survive. In the zoo they have to be trained, and opportunities for an active life have to be scheduled daily by attentive zoo keepers. Wellness begins with a deep understanding of the preferences and the needs of each and every species in the zoo. Zoo veterinarians routinely conduct wellness exams to determine an animal’s total condition. Using operant conditioning techniques, many animals have learned to cooperate for blood pressure readings, and venipuncture without anesthesia. Wellness can be achieved through the application of immediate management techniques and training, and implemented long-term by designing wellness-oriented facilities where animals are activated and stimulated by species-appropriate environmental and social conditions. Wellness is a condition we share with animals, and our growing awareness of what it takes to be well is helping us to extend this outcome to every animal at the zoo.

Behavior Analysis and Training

Going by different labels, including behavioral husbandry and applied behavior analysis, behavioral management is a discipline of psychology that deals with the functional analysis of environment and behavior. Behavioral management is an umbrella term that encompasses many aspects of welfare, including behavior analysis, environmental and cognitive enrichment, environmental design, biological (ecological) constraints, socialization and re-socialization techniques, and both medical and performance training. With this in mind, behavior analysts working in human clinical settings can be recruited to work side by side with zoo keepers, zoo biologists, and zoo veterinarians. Likely as not, behavior therapies developed for use with humans will be effective for many different species. Historically, aquatic parks with marine mammals were among the first to utilize operant conditioning. This was a great step forward because Skinnerian positive control techniques were highly effective with dolphins, sea lions, and birds. One of the first zoos to utilize positive control was the US National Zoo when they hired marine mammal trainer Karen Pryor to mentor keepers to train great apes and other species. The field of behavioral analysis is expanding throughout the world as illustrated by the extraordinary growth in the membership of the Association of Behavior Analysis International (ABAI). Synergistic relationships are feasible through the regional associations of ABAI and organized zoo associations such as SEAZA in Asia. We regard the brokering of such partnerships as a high priority for advocates of a global zoo animal welfare movement.

Can Black-and-White Ruffed Lemurs (Varecia variegata) Solve Object Permanence Tasks?

We examined object permanence in black‐and‐white‐ruffed lemurs (Varecia variegata) at Zoo Atlanta. A series of visible and invisible displacement tasks with suitable controls were presented to five adult subjects. Subjects performed significantly above chance on all regular tasks, except for the double invisible displacements. Subjects failed visible and invisible controls. Failure on the control trials did not appear to be because subjects used the “last box touched” strategy (subjects did not choose the last box touched significantly more than expected by chance). However, a substantial percentage of choices was made to the last box touched by the experimenter. There was no significant difference between this percentage, and the percentage of choices made to the baited box (on both visible and invisible controls), which indicates that subjects were drawn to both boxes which the experimenter visited/touched, and thus failed the controls. Based on the results from the present study, we believe that there is no evidence that black‐and‐white ruffed lemurs understand visible and invisible tasks in the traditional object permanence battery. Am. J. Primatol. 75:376‐386, 2013.

Designing for Animal Welfare

Zoo design throughout the world continues to be inspired by the words of Henry Beston who so eloquently articulated the familiar mantra that engenders such deep respect for the natural world. Building on Beston’s remarkable insight, Robert Sommer understood that animals and people alike are victimized or venerated by the quality of their communities. Sommer’s dichotomy between hard and soft architecture delineated the deficiencies of many traditional institutional settings including mental hospitals, prisons and traditional zoos. The antithesis of the hard zoo is defined by the revolutionary design movement known as “landscape immersion,” an approach pioneered and branded in the 1970s by the Seattle design firm of Jones and Jones. Landscape immersion emphasizes quality over quantity, embodied in the design mantra: “Fewer animals living large.” Living large is living well. Future zoos will likely exhibit fewer species, but larger groups will be necessary, as we have seen in the trend to larger herds of elephants and larger groups of gorillas. A naturalistic simulation requires group size that is sufficient for natural behavior to unfold. Animals require sufficient social complexity to live a normal life. Therefore, facilities should provide additional holding space for other social partners or additional pairs. Such features, on exhibit and behind the scenes, will provide visitors with a more authentic and compelling simulation of the natural world, encourage rotation on the exhibit stage, and provide keepers the flexibility to manage social relationships. Superior zoo animal welfare should be an easy sell for our visitors, our members, and our donors as they cannot enjoy zoos and aquariums that do not meet their expectations. At no time in the history of zoos have so many creative scientists, designers, and leaders been assembled to propel our institutions forward.

Building Ethical Arks

The World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA) published a revision of its benchmark World Zoo and Aquarium Conservation Strategy in 2005. The document included a new section on “Ethics and Animal Welfare.” Although ethics permeates all dimensions of zoo management, zoo animal welfare is fundamentally an ethical issue. An ethical ark, therefore, may be defined as “a zoo or aquarium that is committed to advancing superior animal welfare standards and practices.” Good welfare is inherent in the operating philosophy of all successful zoos, but great welfare requires an extraordinary commitment throughout the organization. We believe that zoo visitors expect and want the organization to designate the health and welfare of the animals as its first priority. Both AZA and WAZA regard welfare as a component of conservation. We believe it is time to consider giving equal institutional priority to conservation and welfare, and to acknowledge that zoos and aquariums can pay homage to both. Field veterinarians support conservation projects by treating sick and injured animals in the field. If welfare is defined as a reduction in suffering then conservation medicine may be regarded as a form of wildlife welfare. Stoinski et al. (Curator 45(2):129–143, 2002) investigated the exposure of zoo visitors to explicit photos of animals killed in the bushmeat trade. It appears that a zoo, largely positioned as a happy family destination, can be an effective venue for delivering unvarnished, alarming conservation messages.

Welfare Metrics Applied

Zoo and aquarium specialists have a long history of modifying inputs such as exhibit design, space restrictions, feeding schedules, social housing conditions and enrichment in an effort to improve animal welfare. Providing an animal with preferred resources is an important component of ensuring welfare, but may not meet the goals of all welfare interventions. Thus, it is important to note the difference in measuring preference and motivation and the implications of the findings from these different types of tasks. Zoo animals are frequently moved to new enclosures, or husbandry routines are changed in an effort to improve positive welfare. By systematically measuring hormone levels before and after a change, and in conjunction with other behavioral measures, we can unravel the underlying hormonal changes associated with positive welfare. The zoo community needs to continue developing its own rigorous techniques for measuring welfare, and we have pointed out some of the substantial challenges associated with this goal, and some potentially useful measures that are specific to zoos. Zoo research design is often hindered by small sample size, and one way to overcome this issue is to perform multi-institutional studies or survey multiple institutions. Another useful tool for zoo scientists is meta-analysis based on the existing literature. As a community, if we continue to run well designed studies and publish our results, we can continue to discover, test, and export useful measures and approaches to assessing animal welfare.

Launching Ethical Arks

Zoo and aquarium directors must be relentlessly vigilant to protect the core ethical values of the organization. We believe that providing optimal welfare for zoo and aquarium animals adds value to the enterprise. Customers demand quality and they will not long patronize any organization that enables suffering or neglect. The priority of operating excellence starts with the health and welfare of every animal in the zoo. For animal welfare science to become animal welfare practice, zoos and aquariums must step up to the challenge of growing our intellectual capital. Outside resources to support the institutional initiatives of curators, keepers, and veterinarians are critical as there aren’t enough scientists to advance zoo animal welfare by their efforts alone. The zoo must become an ethical, caring, uplifting oasis where wildlife can fulfill their destiny as self-sustaining ambassadors for the natural world. The commitment to animal welfare should not be hidden or oblique. Just as conservation has become a salient feature of the modern zoo, so must animal welfare. It is essential that we develop a sophisticated understanding of the biology and the behavior of the animals we manage. It is the thesis of this book that by our history and by our intent, animal welfare is the primary enabler of our bond with the animals entrusted to our care. The enthusiasm of zoo professionals and their communities will determine whether zoo animal welfare will be a passing trend or a permanent and unyielding commitment.

Defining Animal Welfare

Without highly reliable measurement, welfare assessment relies on anecdotal and sometimes anthropomorphic judgments that may not accurately capture or reflect an animal’s state of well-being. It is critical that zoos instead develop objective, reliable, and replicable measures that allow different individuals, at different time points in different settings or contexts, to assess welfare in a consistent manner. There is much to be learned from the welfare metrics of related fields, such as biomedicine or agriculture, but zoos also present a unique set of challenges such as the variety of species, low sample size and the housing of animals that have not been domesticated. Early conceptions of welfare targeted the prevention of suffering, thus many early measurements of welfare were aimed primarily towards reducing or eliminating negative behaviors, such as stereotypic behavior, or reducing associated physiological indicators, such as decreasing cortisol levels. More recently, scientists have begun to focus on identifying measures that indicate an increase in positive welfare. To progress as a science, it is critical to identify effective theories and rule out those that are obsolete or redundant. Given the wide variety of tasks used to measure welfare, and the many complexities and challenges of studying welfare, it is critical to avoid reliance on a single measure, but include multiple measures when analyzing welfare. There is also a pressing need for scientific research to validate metrics of welfare in zoos. Future research should focus on continuing the development of positive measures of welfare by refining behavioral techniques and identifying physiological markers.

Psychology and Animal Welfare

We believe that zoos with scientific credibility can be trusted to do the right thing on behalf of the animals. To keep management on the empirical side, evidence-based managers, scientific staff, and outside collaborators should be at the table when important decisions are made. In his iconic book Man and Animal in the Zoo, Hediger revealed the extent that the field of psychology had influenced his thinking about wildlife in the zoo. Hediger recognized that the principle challenge for the captive animal is its relationship to humankind, and he made this a specialized topic within the interdisciplinary field of zoo biology. Psychological science, broadly applied, may have more potential to advance zoo standards and practices than any other scientific discipline. The fundamental preference of quality over quantity is a principle first articulated by Hediger, based on early field studies of birds. Research on laboratory colonies of nonhuman primates has addressed space as an independent variable, confirming that quality of space is more important than quantity. As zoos began to build more naturalistic exhibits they began to provide for species-appropriate social organization. To enable a naturalistic social network, all credible zoos today design exhibits for larger groups. Social composition in captivity should always be based on our knowledge of social organization in nature. Personality can no longer be ignored as a factor in zoo management. Clearly, the foundation of superior design is behavior, and wellness/welfare issues loom large as design priorities. To establish the connection between design and welfare, we should gather evidence through post-occupancy evaluations of new exhibits.