Today I tried OkCupid.com’s relationship assessment - it was quick, easy & had very interesting questions that I have not seen in other assessments.  The results are stereotypes & very general.  This assessment is obviously focused on fun rather than genuine matching.  Also, I would question some of reasoning & logic behind their assessment with questions such as:

• What makes OkCupid so awesome is the underlying romantic analysis we perform. Every question delicately modifies a sophisticated multidimensional measure of your personality. Would you rather get caught masturbating by your mother or father?

• Would you rather die yourself or have 10 random people in the world die?

The Sonnet Deliberate Gentle Love Dreamer (DGLD) Romantic, hopeful, and composed. You are the Sonnet. Get it? Composed? Sonnets want Love and have high ideals about it. They’re conscientious people, caring & careful. You yourself have deep convictions, and you devote a lot of thought to romance and what it should be. This will frighten away most potential mates, but that’s okay, because you’re very choosy with your affections anyway. You’d absolutely refuse to date someone dumber than you, for instance. Lovers who share your idealized perspective, or who are at least willing to totally throw themselves into a relationship, will be very, very happy with you. And you with them. You’re already selfless and compassionate, and with the right partner, there’s no doubt you can be sensual, even adventurously so. You probably have lots of female friends, and they have a special soft spot for you. Babies do, too, at the tippy-top of their baby skulls. Your exact female opposite: Genghis Khunt Random Brutal Sex Master Always avoid: The 5-Night Stand (DBSM), The False Messiah (DBLM), The Hornivore (RBSM), The Last Man on Earth (RBSD) Consider: The Loverboy (RGLM)

Link: The Online Dating Persona Test | OkCupid - singles | Dating

The types of men are:

1. The Backrubber- Deliberate Gentle Sex Dreamer (DGSD)
2. The Bachelor - Deliberate Gentle Sex Master (DGSM)
3. The Slow Dancer Deliberate Gentle Love Dreamer (DGLD)
4. The Gentleman - Deliberate Gentle Love Master (DGLM)
5. The Billy Goat - Deliberate Brutal Sex Dreamer (DBSD)
6. The 5-Night Stand - Deliberate Brutal Sex Master(DBSM)
7. The Mixed Messenger - Deliberate Brutal Love Dreamer (DBLD)
8. The False Messiah - Deliberate Brutal Love Master(DBLM)
9. The Poolboy - Random Gentle Sex Dreamer (RGSD)
10. The Playboy - Random Gentle Sex Master (RGSM)
11. The Boy Next Door - Random Gentle Love Dreamer (RGLD)
12. The Loverboy - Random Gentle Love Master (RGLM)
13. The Last Man on Earth - Random Brutal Sex Dreamer (RBSD)
14. The Hornivore - Random Brutal Sex Master (RBSM)
15. The Manchild - Random Brutal Love Dreamer (RBLD)
16. The Vapor Trail - Random Brutal Love Master (RBLM)

And for women:

1. The Intern - Deliberate Gentle Sex Dreamer (DGSD)
2. The Dirty Little Secret - Deliberate Gentle Sex Master (DGSM)
3. The Sonnet - Deliberate Gentle Love Dreamer (DGLD)
4. The Maid of Honor - Deliberate Gentle Love Master (DGLM)
5. The Nymph - Deliberate Brutal Sex Dreamer (DBSD)
6. The Stiletto - Deliberate Brutal Sex Master (DBSM)
7. The Priss - Deliberate Brutal Love Dreamer (DBLD)
8. The Battleaxe - Deliberate Brutal Love Master (DBLM)
9. The Nurse - Random Gentle Sex Dreamer (RGSD)
10. The Playstation - Random Gentle Sex Master (RGSM)
11. The Window Shopper - Random Gentle Love Dreamer (RGLD)
12. The Peach - Random Gentle Love Master (RGLM)
13. Half-Cocked - Random Brutal Sex Dreamer (RBSD)
14. Genghis Khunt - Random Brutal Sex Master (RBSM)
15. The Wild Rose - Random Brutal Love Dreamer (RBLD)
16. The Sudden Departure - Random Brutal Love Master (RBLM)

This is a light hearted & fun but very general & stereotypical assessment & would obviously yield results in the same vein.  OkCupid however does not make you sign up to do the assessment & is obiously transparent.  I would give this assessment a 6 for these reasons but would suggest not to rely on it for real matching on their site.  I would parallel it to the kind of questionnaires in women’s magazines along with the results, not to be taken too seriously.  Let me know what you think & your experience on this site with matching with others in the comments.

Heres a funny video on how much pain & shock can really happen when cupid shoots his arrows…..

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Today I am reviewing DatingDirect.com’s Affinity assessment for matching up with partners on their website.  The assessment took a good 3/4 hour but was not too boring.  As soon as I completed it I was shown a page of potential matches who scored 66 to 72% with my matching criteria.  I checked out some of them which were a bit disappointing for me.  The UK site claims to have 49% men and 51% women.  Regarding their affinity assessment, they quote on their website as per below:

We have developed our unique affinity test together with AssessFirst, a company specialised in the evaluation of psychological and behavioural characteristics. The test is based on the very highest standards of analysis as defined by the American Psychological Association and the Educational Testing Service.

The affinity test has around one hundred questions designed to explore your personality across 71 different psychological criteria, including your fundamental values, and your views on areas such as life, love, family and money.

Unfortunately AssessFirst is a French company and do not have an English site that I can find.  So I have not been able to get any further background to the assessment than the simple information provided on the DatingDirect website.  Further quote from their site:

Your affinity test results allow your personality report to be defined according to three groups of criteria:

* Your values, which are the fundamental constituents of your personality. Deeply embedded in each of us, these values are virtually immutable;
* Your outlook or way of looking at the world (relationships, family, religion etc);
* Your personality and the way you behave towards others.

In addition to your personality report, we can suggest the traits and characteristics that you should look for in an ideal partner.

The affinity test results allow us to show our members how compatible they are with each other. Once you have taken the affinity test, you can see your affinity score with each other member, and read a report with a detailed breakdown of your compatibility.

Matching people in this way, based on a cross match of common interests, values and the compatibility of personalities, significantly increases your chances of meeting someone with whom you can develop a strong and lasting relationship.

Joining DatingDirectAffinity.com is free! As part of the free service you can: take the unique affinity test and read the results in your personality report; complete your profile, upload your photos and write your personal ad; view your suggested matches, see you affinity score with them and view your detailed compatibility reports; read the online advice from our experts and watch the coaching videos; exchange a first message with each member for free!

If after exchanging a first message you want to continue the conversation and have the best possible chance of meeting your one in a million, you will need to take out a subscription. With a subscription, you can use all the services on DatingDirectAffinity.com, including exchanging as many messages with other members as you like and contacting our coaching team on the relationship hotline.

I appreciate the fact that the site has coaching advertised & promoted which of course will support their members in starting & continuing in any relationship & that gives them extra clout.

However unfortunately to date I have not received my affinity assessment, after I took the time to complete their questionnaire & two hours later I am still awaiting the  email with the assessment.  They ensure that at least their members have a bona fide email address because you cannot receive your affinity assessment otherwise, and they give you a second chance to change your email address at the beginning of the assessment.  Their ‘confirm your email address’ emails came immediately but the profile still hasn’t arrived which doesn’t make me feel too great about their offer & I have not had to wait for the results on any other site that I have reviewed.  This is personal information about me & I should have access to it immediately???  Due to this they have lost points in my review, they could have scored a 9 but I will rate their affinity assessment only a 7.  I complained on the site but don’t expect any response soon, and you can find a number of complaints about the site here.

I will leave you with a great video from Graham Norton which is a funny look at speed dating…..

Check out some of the great REAL blogs here!

Singlesnet.com are at present one of the top in the polls for online dating sites in the US, so I thought I would do a review of their relationship assessment.  I called this post ‘No Review of Singlesnet.com Relationship Assessment as contrary to what they advertise on their homepage, there doesnt seem to be any access to any matching assessment or algorithm?

Free to - use the compatibility matching technology and view photos

There were certainly lots of photos posted as soon as you complete the brief registration process & questions.  So they deliver that aspect, but there is no relationship assessment that is transparent & investigable.  However if you are willing to part with money immediately you may discover it, i.e. $24.95 a month????

You get more
Singlesnet.com offers a unique personality matching technology that caters to its featured members. We believe that there is more to meeting the right person than just simple e-mail communication. Once you upgrade the compatibility matching technology, we will recognize you as a featured member and will work harder to find you that perfect match.
Match priority
Matching your profile with our members will have a higher priority over all standard members — dramatically increasing responses to your ad.

I guess I am curious about how they will work harder to find your match?????   I would avoid this site if you are looking for a good match as there is nothing mentioned on their site about their matching process.  As Dave Evans from Online Dating Insider exposes in his post end of last year:

What is a “One to one match notification?” What are we matching on? There is so little information captured in profiles, no wonder the only search option is zip code.

There are also some more warnings in comments on Mark Brook’s Online Personal Watch. It’s a pity that sites like these are on the web giving a lot of people very bad experiences in finding a match!  It discredits the whole industry really.

To take the bad taste out of our mouths, here’s a very funny video from Eddie Izzard about procreation.  Enjoy….

Today I’m reviewing the Parship.co.uk’s Relationship assessment.  It took about 30minutes or so to complete & is touted on their website as:

A sound scientific basis: Our unique free test was developed by respected psychologists. PARSHIP introduced online compatibility profiling in Europe.  Years of experience have proved that PARSHIP can help you find someone really right for you.  The PARSHIP test generates your personality profile. It is a psychometric test, combining psychology and statistics and is based on 40 years of research into relationships.

I found it difficult to track down more detailed information about their psychometric tool and that the above really doesn’t say anything very informative about the assessment.

This assessment has been developed by Professor Hugo Schmale.

It quantifies the attributes and characteristics that determine how a relationship works between two people. That is why it can match you with people who should be genuinely compatible with you. Once you have completed the test, you can view the profiles of all the PARSHIP members whose profiles are compatible with yours and who meet your specific search criteria (e.g. age, location, whether they already have children). You will also be able to view a comparison of your two profiles to determine how well you match.  The test runs to 80 questions and divides into five areas: relationships, leisure time, everyday life, impulses and life. It will take about twenty minutes to complete. (If you are unable to complete the test in one session, you can log out and return to it at a later point, starting where you left off.) The PARSHIP test is based on behavioral science and psychoanalytical theory. It covers the values, attitudes and behavioral patterns that determine the success of a relationship.  Important in the formulation of the test was the work of such figures as the psychoanalysts Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, the sociologist Georg Simmel and the psychologist Hans Eysenck. Also incorporated into the test were the findings of studies by the following experts: Prof. Dr. Hugo Schmale (University of Hamburg), Prof. Dr. Johannes Brengelmann (Max Planck Institute, Munich), Prof. Dr. Kurt Hahlweg (Technical University of Braunschweig) und Prof. Dr. Jürg Willi (University of Zürich; the Collusion Model of Partnership Development).

The questions were easy & somewhat interesting compared to the questionnaires on some of the dating sites.  The initial free version of the assessment is brief and if you want more detailed report, cost is £GBP56 or you have to sign up for the Premium Membership.  Even the free assessment was a good education for anyone wanting to know a little about the definitions of some of the psychological terms.

They also provide a couple of graphs in the initial free model, these two are from my assessment:

&

Simple & to the point!

When I asked Tony Blin-Stoyle, Director of UK & Ireland Parship about Parship assessments, he responded ‘In fact… you have to take it to use the service and therefore “people’s use or lack of use of this tool to support them in finding great matches” is not relevant. They all use it and find great matches!’  Thanks for the feedback Tony!

I found that the simplicity was a disadvantage, it just wasn’t a really good accurate perception of me & my relationship needs.  At one point in some of the questions, I instinctively felt that my individual response could not be covered & seeing the results proved me right.  Having said that however, Parship’s psychometric tool, as Tony said above, is necessity to complete to be able to get onto Parship’s site.  This eliminates the problem that other dating sites experience where not all members have completed the questionnaire, particularly the men.  They also have videos on the site explaining the assessment.  As a result the odds would be much higher of finding a reasonable match on Parship’s sites.  The initial time sacrifice of completing the questionnaire has to be built in to the investment of joining Parship.  I would give them a 9 out of 10 for their assessment, for what it lacks in detail & accuracy, they gain in using the assessment as entry to the site.  Of course astrology can provide detail & accuracy in relationship assessments with the minimum of time outlay!

I’ll leave you with the last of the series of videos filmed at Lisdoonvarna Matchmaking Festival in Ireland by David Starkey.  This is definitely a different way of finding a partner, so enjoy…..

PlentyofFish.com has two assessments to support better relationships for their members. The initial assessment is a Chemistry Predictor & then you can complete a Needs Assessment. PlentyofFish is a free site created by Markus Frind and these assessments are also free.

PlentyofFish.com quotes re their Needs Assessment:

This assessment is a scientifically valid tool that conforms to professional testing standards set forth by the 1999 Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing as issued jointly by the American Educational Research Association, the American Psychological Association and the National Council on Measurement in Education (2002, Washington, DC: Author). The Relationship Needs Assessment was constructed in four main steps: (1) The psychological assessment team reviewed the academic literature to identify some of the most crucial types of relationships needs people of all backgrounds share. (2) The team then studied the best practice methods of measuring these relationship needs and adapted these methods for the present assessment, which was grounded in Modern Test Theory. Modern Test Theory is the name for the gold standard statistics used in such well known assessments like the GRE, MCAT and LSAT. Even Microsoft uses Modern Test Theory in its software accreditation testing. The team prepared approximately 500 assessment items for possible use. (3) A validation survey was subsequently conducted and over 12,000 members of PlentyofFish participated. Scaling and bias testing analytics were applied to the raw data collected from that survey. These analytics allowed us to identify test items and questions that form unbiased scales for each of the nine relationship needs. In other words, the team improved the psychometric quality of the existing best practice methods for measuring the various relationship needs.  (4) The models for the nine relationship factors were studied and interpreted by a panel of clinical psychologists, statisticians and relationship experts. This panel then prepared the general feedback and customized “Action Plans” that form the feedback reports.

I found that the questionnaire was quick & easy to complete & in keeping with the input, the resulting assessment was brief & simple to understand.  It got the basic points but not very much detail.  For most people however it gives a basic understanding of themselves & their relationship needs.

From birth to age 18, a girl needs good parents, from 18 to 35 she needs good looks, from 35 to 55 she needs a good personality, and from 55 on she needs cash. Sophie Tucker

The Plentyoffish Relationship Chemistry Predictor (POFCP) covers:

• Self-Confidence
• Family Orientation
• Self-Control
• Social Dependency/Openness
• Easygoingness

The real problem between the sexes is that for men, sex is a gender-underliner, they need it for their egos. We don’t need sex to make us feel we are the person we need to be. Carol Clewlow

The second questionnaire consists of 100 questions & takes a bit longer to complete. It is the PlentyofFish Relationship Needs Assessment which scores on the following:

• Interdependence
• Intimacy
• Self-Efficacy
• Relationship Readiness
• Communication
• Conflict Resolution
• Sexuality
• Attitudes About Love
• Preferred Expressions of Affection

An added bonus on PlentyofFish.com are:

each user receives customized “Action Plans” that outline specific questions and topics for the user to ask or explore with potential partners.

This is a real plus that helps PlentyofFish to stand out with their assessments.  Good work Markus!

However as with other dating site relationship assessments, it is still reliant on members completing the assessment.  This is the only way that those who do complete it can match up with them.  The questions then need to be completed on other’s profiles for the ‘Needs Assessment’.   I would give this assessment an 8.5 out of 10 as time & attention is still required for the system to work amongst members.  With astrological relationship profiling, I could garner the same information & more with entry of DOB & place of birth and of course time of birth if it is available which brings even more detailed information to the piece.

When I talked to Markus in London at the Internet Dating Conference in September’08, he said that keeping things simple on his site is what the users want & it seems to work.  It seems there really are plenty of fish in the sea, they currently have 900,000 active daily users.  The questionnaires are certainly very simple & reasonably quick to complete.  There are no graphics just simple summary results.

Even when you think you know who you are & what you want, it is important that others also recognize you for you really are.  Here is an hysterical video with Eddie Izzard’s monologue about not being acknowledged for who you are.  Enjoy…..