Match.com — for Dogs

Admit it, the last couple dates with people you've met online have been disasters.

At best.

No more disappointments if you move your focus to a dog rather than a person.

Yeah, yeah, I know — all men are dogs, yadda yadda.

But let's move on already, okay?

Sharon L. Peters, in an August 22, 2007 USA Today story, explored the nascent world of dog-human matchups resulting from a new program in place at about 100 animal shelters nationwide.

Here's the article.

Program's goal: To fetch your perfect pet

Finding just the right dog can be almost as tough as finding Ms. or Mr. Right.

The chosen canine might, for a certain person, turn out to be too crazy or too lazy, too distant or too dependent, too rough or too ready. And everyone's less than happy.

Now, about 100 animal shelters — from Portland, Maine, to Columbus, Ohio, to Boulder, Colo. — are using a matchup process from the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) to help pet seekers choose a canine that's likely to fit their lifestyle and dog-behavior preferences.

"We hear every week from adopters who tell us how easily the dog has meshed into their life and how happy they are with the one they chose," says Susan Britt, director of operations for the Animal Refuge League (ARL) of Greater Portland.

The Meet Your Match Canine-ality and Puppy-ality programs have been so successful in increasing adoptions and reducing the return rates of dogs and puppies at shelters using them that a similar Feline-ality program for cats has been developed and tested and will be launched in September.

"Science is much better than emotion" in guiding a person to the perfect-for-you dog, says Emily Weiss, a certified applied animal behaviorist. She developed the two-pronged tool that assesses and classifies canines according to their personalities and likely post-adoption behavior and also quizzes would-be adopters.

This process "helps people zero in on the dogs that best fit what they tell us they expect from a dog," Weiss says.

The program was created to deal with the reality that as many as 20 of every 100 dogs adopted from some shelters are soon returned, many of them because of the dog's energy level or other personality traits.

The way Meet Your Match works: Shelter personnel conduct an assessment with each dog to determine its friendliness, playfulness, energy level and motivation or drive. Each dog is scored and placed into one of three color-coded maintenance categories: easy (purple), average (orange) or high (green). And within each of those three categories there are three descriptors, such as "life of the party," "wallflower" and "couch potato," all with details about specific behaviors that can be anticipated.

For example, a dog described as a "goofball" (within the orange category) is a "fun-lover" who needs "someone who loves to laugh and play around."

Puppies undergo a different assessment process and are assigned such descriptions as "class clown" and "rookie."

Humans, meanwhile, complete a five-minute, 18-question survey that provides insights into their expectations, previous dog-care experience, lifestyle and home environment. The questionnaire is scored, and the person is assigned a color that correlates with the type of dog or puppy that best fits.

Then an easy stroll through the facility quickly identifies, through the colored cards on each kennel, which dogs are the best fit for that person or family.

Marie and George Eich recently adopted a Rottweiler from ARL after filling out the survey, and he has turned out to be just what his assessment promised: "He's such a gentleman," Marie Eich says, just as "mellow" and "well-mannered" as they had expected.

Sometimes people fall in love with a dog whose card color doesn't match theirs. They are not blocked from adopting that dog.

"We simply explain that it's not the ideal match, but if it's the dog you really want, we want to send you home with the best information possible about how this dog is likely to behave," Weiss says.

And people rarely return those less-than-perfect fits, Britt says, because "when a person gets the animal they were expecting, even if it isn't necessarily a perfect fit, they're OK with that."

The program took root in 2001 when the Kansas Humane Society realized a need for a good match tool. Weiss already was working on some measurement aspects, and within months, her protocols and surveys were being used. KHS saw an almost immediate 50% drop in the number of returned dogs.

The ASPCA got wind of the program, and in 2003 it acquired rights to make it available to shelters nationwide. Weiss then developed the puppy assessment program, which she says is being used by about 35 shelters.

Many participating shelters report results similar to those at The Capital Area Humane Society in Hilliard, Ohio, where the return rate has dropped from 14% to 9% and adoptions have increased by 15%, the ASPCA says. In the two years since the Maine facility has been using the process, the return rate for dogs has dropped from 12% to 15% to a current, steady 4%, Britt says.

Moreover, the whole adoption process is faster and more pleasant, Britt says. The previous process, as with most shelters, was time-consuming and labor-intensive, and even then people took home dogs not wholly right for them.

Now, she says, would-be adopters spend five minutes filling out the survey, it's scored instantly, and they can meet dogs most likely to meet their needs and expectations.

As for creating a similar tool for cats, Weiss had to start back at square one. "Cats are a whole different animal," she says, laughing.

Beta testing in five facilities has shown the Feline-ality Meet Your Match program to be highly effective.

"We now have so much more information about how individual cats will be in the home environment," says Britt, whose facility was a test site.

Feline-ality is even helping them succeed in an arena shelters struggle with: getting new homes for older cats.

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The patron saint of this new approach has to be former president Harry S. Truman who, in response to a reporter's question about whether he had any friends in the nation's capitol, replied, "If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog."

w00f!

That's canine for "w00t!"