A snapshot from an AI-generated wildlife video

A video is circulating on social media in which a leopard enters the backyard of a house where a child is playing, and a cat confronts the leopard and scares it away, protecting the child. The video has garnered over a million “likes” and has been shared more than 15,000 times.

Another series of videos shows bears or deer jumping on a trampoline in a backyard. In another, three raccoons float down a river riding on three crocodiles. All of these videos are created by artificial intelligence, and thanks to their high degree of realism, appear to be real.

Given the proliferation of these types of videos and the lack of research on this topic in scientific literature, researchers from the GESBIO group at the University of Cordoba—José Guerrero, Francisco Sánchez, Antonio Carpio, Rocío Serrano, and Tamara Murillo—have spotlighted this issue, analyzing the different consequences that these AI-generated videos have on the knowledge and conservation of wild species.

The paper is published in the journal Conservation Biology.

The main problems the researchers have detected after analyzing the most shared videos on social media are misperceptions of wild animals (it is highly unlikely that a leopard would jump into a backyard, and that a cat would confront it), the attribution of human characteristics and behaviors to animals, and the increasing disconnect between society and the natural world.

“They reflect characteristics, behaviors, habitats, or relationships between species that are not real. For example, we see predators and prey playing. They show us animals with human behaviors that are far from reality,” explains Guerrero. “The video of the child playing in the yard, the one featuring the leopard, undermines the conservation of a species like this, as you will never encounter it in that situation,” he continues.

“There is already a total disconnect between citizens and wildlife, which is particularly pronounced among primary school children, as we saw in the IncluScienceMe project, which demonstrates a lack of knowledge of local fauna among young children. These videos create false connections with nature, as vulnerable species appear more abundant in these videos, and that is negative for conservation,” points out Serrano.

These videos also cause frustration among young children, who expect to go out into the countryside and find a capybara, or have a wild animal come up to greet them.

“If young children go out into the countryside and don’t find these animals with more charismatic or magical characteristics and behaviors, it has the opposite effect in terms of connection,” she emphasizes.

Considering that, during childhood, the main form of learning is through images, this creates a distorted image. In addition, the increased use of social media as a source of information (especially among young people) exacerbates the negative impact of these videos.

“We are faced with another serious problem: the demand for exotic species as pets,” says Murillo. Exposure to these exotic and charismatic animals, which are assigned sociable temperaments, makes more and more people want to have them at home.

The strategies proposed by the team include media literacy, providing citizens with tools to question and verify information by turning to reliable sources,and “trying to introduce environmental knowledge into school curricula, clarifying concepts such as native, what an exotic species is, and ensuring that children understand from an early age that there are no lions here,” recalls Francisco Sánchez.

This qualitative work opens up a line of study that had not been explored until now and promotes further research into the effects of AI-generated content on biodiversity conservation.

More information: José Guerrero‐Casado et al, Threats to conservation from artificial‐intelligence‐generated wildlife images and videos, Conservation Biology (2025). DOI: 10.1111/cobi.70138

Citation: AI-generated wildlife videos generate confusion and threaten conservation efforts (2025, November 4) retrieved 4 November 2025 from https://phys.org/news/2025-11-ai-generated-wildlife-videos-generate.html

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