Overview
Paws4Survival is a non-profit rescue and adoption service that rescues dogs and cats out of Puerto Rico. Over the course of two months, I prepared personas, interviews, surveys, heuristic evaluations, card sort studies, and diary studies to understand the Paws4Survival audience and provide proper analysis. In the prototype stage, I launched a comprehensive usability test. This lead to the final product, a 34 page report detailing each step and a list of recommendations a designer could follow to update the website’s overall look and improve the website’s user experience.
Based on user research, I provided a list of functional improvements such as: adding hyperlinks, adding a search function and filter system, and adding a save button to adoption applications. In terms of UI and layout, simple changes like adding more pictures, updating the banner, and title pages were suggested.
Paws4Survival Research Artifacts
Below is a collection of Paws4Survival User Research artifacts including interview, diary study and survey templates, a card sorting experiment conducted in April 2020, and a comprehensive usability testing report.
Paws4Survival: The Back Story
When I was five years old, my family adopted a dog; a beautiful female pointer mix that I named “Mickey.” From then on, helping animals became my passion. I volunteered at my local animal rescue shelter up until college. Then at Penn State, I volunteered for another animal rescue and adoption service known as “Blind Dog Rescue” and became the treasurer of The Penn State Animal Volunteers, an organization that volunteered at local shelters and raised funds to donate to various animal non-profits.
My passion for helping animals eventually led to adopting my very own special rescue dogs from Puerto Rico: Bruno, a terrified chihuahua puppy with horrible separation anxiety, and two years later, Brinkley, a calmer, slightly older chihuahua who is only interested in cuddling and comforting her nervous brother.
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