It wasn’t a regular log or stick, nor a magical music-playing one, but a device that researcher Rébecca Kleinberger had created, born of the question: How can we use technology to improve and enrich the lives of animals?
Sampson’s caretaker at the San Diego Zoo asked Kleinberger if she could create a tool Sampson could use to listen to music. What they didn’t realize is that Sampson would use the Joy Branch, as it was named, as a tool to draw visitors to his exhibit — and away from others, she said.
“It’s really his own agency and its own intrinsic behavior that led to, actually, him using his branch a lot and using it not just to control music, but to also attract visitors and have more meaningful interaction with people at the zoo,” Kleinberger told MassLive.
Since the project with Sampson in 2019, Kleinberger, now an assistant professor at Northeastern University, has pioneered research focused on animal enrichment through her Interspecies Technology for Enrichment and Research on Animal Connection and Togetherness (INTERACT) Animal Lab. She works with all types of species in different settings, including pets, zoos, wildlife, lab and farm animals.
She worked with Sampson when she was a researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she received her master’s and doctoral degrees.
“We can never really prove that an animal understands what they are doing or that they have control, but we can look into the engagement they have with it, how often they use it,” Kleinberger said.
“And of course, each time we do a project, we work with a lot of experts, professionals on those species to help review our recording and our data and to tell us whether, with their expertise, they believe that the animal has some sense making of their control,” she said.
WHAT KLEINBERGER IS WORKING ON NOW
Last spring, Kleinberger taught a class on designing technology for animals, which included 16 Northeastern students and some students from MIT and Harvard University. Some of them stayed during the summer to help deploy technologies and test them at Zoo New England, which includes Franklin Park Zoo in Boston and Stone Zoo in Stoneham.
A separate research project Kleinberger is working on with Tandem Vet Care, a technological veterinary clinic, examines how to reduce the stress cats experience during a veterinary appointment.
Kleinberger wasn’t able to provide more information on either research project, but said her research will be published in the coming months.
CAN PARROTS MAKE VIDEO CALLS? USE TOUCHSCREEN GAMES?
Kleinberger’s lab has gained recognition over the years for projects that are fun and playful.
Kleinberger, in partnership with the University of Glasgow in Scotland, conducted a three-month study to understand how 20 pet parrots would interact with and use touchscreen games. The research was part of a paper published in 2024. The researchers aimed to understand the games’ potential for animal enrichment and discovered how to tailor them based on the tactile needs of parrots.
The year before, the lab — also in partnership with the University of Glasgow — ran a separate three-month study with 18 pet birds to evaluate the value and usability of a parrot-to-parrot video calling system. Most birds interacted with the system, resulting in 147 bird-triggered calls. Some of the birds were able to select specific birds to call.
Caretakers saw benefits of the study, such as birds learning how to fly or forage from the bird on the other side of the video call.
HOW IS INTERACT ANIMAL LAB UNIQUE?
There are labs across the world that have created technology to test animal intelligence or to understand their behavior.
However, what makes Kleinberger’s lab so unique is that it isn’t trying to do that.
“We’re not there to test them. We’re there to try to see how can we improve their life, how can we use every tool we have and create new tools to make a difference in their lives?” Kleinberger said.
Kleinberger carefully considers the ethics of using technology for animals and the partners she collaborates with. She works only with accredited zoos and partners that maintain a high standard of animal welfare.
“Our work is also about educating the public, working with zookeepers really closely to better understand the needs of animals there,” she said.
“There’s always this problem. Even when you work with the farming industry — how do you make sure you’re not just putting a band aid on or making something more acceptable when it shouldn’t be acceptable?" she later added.
Humans have a responsibility to try to enrich animal lives, she said, in part because we are often the ones who harm their natural environments and also because technology can be used to help.
“There is so much potential because so much of the technology is there. The tools are not in the hands of the right people. And what’s also missing a lot are framework and evaluation and ways to assess the impact we make on animals,” Kleinberger said.
There’s been a boom in pet technology over the years, including sensors and cameras that communicate with pets when their owners are away, Kleinberger said. However, none of the technology has been rigorously evaluated to understand the impact on animals — and often, the technology is designed for human benefit rather than for animal benefit, she added.
“All of the work with Koko the gorilla and sign language and animal translation, I see it as really trying to have the animal go most of the way toward our human languages, and I’m trying to do the inverse,” she said.
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