Fishing with friends: using tabletop games to raise environmental awareness in aquariums

We present the design and evaluation of an exhibit on the consequences of overfishing that we deployed at a local aquarium. The exhibit, Fishing with Friends, is a multiplayer game in which visitors compete to earn money by catching fish. As the game progresses, overzealous fishing results in damage to a simulated ocean ecosystem. Our goal is to encourage visitors to reflect on damage caused by overfishing and discuss strategies to preserve shared ocean resources. Aquariums are leading the effort to inform the general public about issues of marine sustainability. However, it is challenging to make these complex topics engaging and accessible to a diverse audiences in real-world settings. We conducted a study with 523 visitors at the aquarium to evaluate our design. Results from a questionnaire suggest that engagement with Fishing with Friends improved our target audience's awareness of environmental issues compared to those who were not exposed to the game. Our results also highlight challenges of using interactive tabletops displays in crowded and chaotic exhibit halls. On average, 52.6 visitors interacted with the game every hour that the exhibit was on display; this rapid flow limited engagement and presented unique design challenges that we discuss in this paper. Future work will be needed to assess longer term impacts and to compare game play to other forms of interactive and non-interactive interventions.

[1]  Roy Ballantyne,et al.  Promoting environmentally sustainable attitudes and behaviour through free‐choice learning experiences: what is the state of the game? , 2005 .

[2]  Yvonne Rogers,et al.  Rethinking 'multi-user': an in-the-wild study of how groups approach a walk-up-and-use tabletop interface , 2011, CHI.

[3]  D. McKenzie‐Mohr,et al.  Fostering Sustainable Behavior: An Introduction to Community-Based Social Marketing , 1999 .

[4]  James Paul Gee,et al.  Learning by Design: Good Video Games as Learning Machines , 2005 .

[5]  John H. Falk,et al.  Investigating the impact of prior knowledge and interest on aquarium visitor learning , 2003 .

[6]  Dan Cosley,et al.  ArtLinks: fostering social awareness and reflection in museums , 2008, CHI.

[7]  Paul Marshall,et al.  Beyond one-size-fits-all: how interactive tabletops support collaborative learning , 2011, IDC.

[8]  Hayes Raffle,et al.  Social immersive media: pursuing best practices for multi-user interactive camera/projector exhibits , 2009, CHI.

[9]  Richard C. Thompson,et al.  Towards a Marine Mindset: Visiting an Aquarium Can Improve Attitudes and Intentions Regarding Marine Sustainability , 2013 .

[10]  Michael S. Horn,et al.  Visualizing the Tree of Life : Learning Around an Interactive Visualization of Biological Data in Museums , 2014 .

[11]  Sue Allen,et al.  Designing With Multiple Interactives: Five Common Pitfalls , 2004 .

[12]  Joshua P. Gutwill,et al.  Fostering Active Prolonged Engagement : The Art of Creating APE Exhibits , 2017 .

[13]  Eva Hornecker,et al.  “I don’t understand it either, but it is cool” - visitor interactions with a multi-touch table in a museum , 2008, 2008 3rd IEEE International Workshop on Horizontal Interactive Human Computer Systems.

[14]  Yvonne Rogers,et al.  Actions speak loudly with words: unpacking collaboration around the table , 2009, ITS '09.

[15]  Meredith Ringel Morris,et al.  Experiences with and observations of direct-touch tabletops , 2006, First IEEE International Workshop on Horizontal Interactive Human-Computer Systems (TABLETOP '06).

[16]  J. G. Tanenbaum,et al.  Futura: design for collaborative learning and game play on a multi-touch digital tabletop , 2010, TEI.

[17]  Michael S. Horn,et al.  Of BATs and APEs: an interactive tabletop game for natural history museums , 2012, CHI.

[18]  M. Sheelagh T. Carpendale,et al.  Gestures in the wild: studying multi-touch gesture sequences on interactive tabletop exhibits , 2011, CHI.

[19]  Yvonne Rogers,et al.  Collaboration and interference: awareness with mice or touch input , 2008, CSCW.

[20]  P. Dillenbourg.  What do you mean by collaborative learning , 1999 .

[21]  W. Verbeke,et al.  Perceived Importance of Sustainability and Ethics Related to Fish: A Consumer Behavior Perspective , 2007, Ambio.

[22]  J. Falk,et al.  Impact of National Aquarium in Baltimore on Visitors' Conservation Attitudes, Behavior, and Knowledge , 2000 .

[23]  Yoshiyuki Nakamura,et al.  Familial collaborations in a museum , 2009, CHI.

[24]  Alyssa Friend Wise,et al.  Youtopia: a collaborative, tangible, multi-touch, sustainability learning activity , 2013, IDC.

[25]  C. Heath,et al.  Interaction and interactives: collaboration and participation with computer-based exhibits , 2005 .

[26]  Ben Kirman,et al.  Practical, appropriate, empirically-validated guidelines for designing educational games , 2011, CHI.

[27]  R. Hilborn,et al.  Overfishing: What Everyone Needs to Know , 2012 .

[28]  J. Falk,et al.  Learning from Museums: Visitor Experiences and the Making of Meaning , 2000 .

[29]  M. Pinsky,et al.  Marine defaunation: Animal loss in the global ocean , 2015, Science.

[30]  N. Murray,et al.  Assessing informal learning in an aquarium using pre- and post-visit drawings , 2012 .

[31]  G. Hardin,et al.  The Tragedy of the Commons , 1968, Green Planet Blues.

[32]  Michael S. Horn,et al.  “Whoa! We’re going deep in the trees!”: Patterns of collaboration around an interactive information visualization exhibit , 2015, International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning.

[33]  Anne Marie Piper,et al.  Setting the stage for embodied activity: scientific discussion around a multitouch tabletop display , 2012, Int. J. Learn. Technol..

[34]  Michael S. Horn,et al.  Fluid Grouping: Quantifying Group Engagement around Interactive Tabletop Exhibits in the Wild , 2015, CHI.

[35]  Alyssa Friend Wise,et al.  Getting Down to Details: Using Theories of Cognition and Learning to Inform Tangible User Interface Design , 2013, Interact. Comput..