Gulf News gets in the water with the South African fur seal at the recently opened Sea Lion Point at Atlantis on the Palm. Daily headlines from the UAE and around the world brought to you by Gulf News. See more at: http://gulfnews.com/gntv
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00:00At this moment, we are in our newest attraction, which is the Sea Lion Point.
00:21And we are really proud to have added to our already family of dolphins, of Indo-Pacific
00:26bottlenose dolphins, an amazing family of fur seals.
00:30So right now, we are here to experience our new sea lion discovery that is intended to
00:38be an experience where the guests can enjoy going inside the water and do more or less
00:43what they are able to do when they do a shallow water or dolphin encounter with the dolphins.
00:48Everybody asks, normally, how do we train our marine mammals?
00:52Because the methodology is the same.
00:54We use something that is called operant conditioning.
00:58And within the operant conditioning, we have chosen the positive reinforcement, which basically
01:03means you do something good, and you will get something good in return.
01:06It's basic human or child psychology.
01:10It's not very different than that.
01:13And we use, besides the positive reinforcement, a variety of rewards that everybody asks,
01:20are you only giving fish?
01:22The animals are just working because they love the fish.
01:24Very, very, very far from that.
01:26It's true, the fish is a primary reinforcement, but we also have many secondary reinforcements
01:33that are as important as the primary reinforcements.
01:36They are based on the trust and caring relationship that they develop with the trainers or the
01:41marine mammal specialists.
01:43But also, they prefer certain toys.
01:45They prefer the companion of other specific animals.
01:49They like certain activities to do more that are more rewarding for them than others.
01:55So all that creates a viability in their lives, making it enriching.
02:00And we ensure that all the experiences that they do with humans, not only the trainers,
02:05but with the guests, are very enriching, not only for the guests, but also for our animals.
02:10That for us is the most important thing of all.