Human Involvement in E-Coaching: Effects on Effectiveness, Perceived Influence and Trust

Coaching practices are rapidly changing due to technological advances in the area of pervasive computing: the behavior of coachees can be monitored real-time, and coaching can be remote or even fully automated. The movement towards autonomous e-coaching systems holds promise for improving self-management, but also gives rise to questions about the importance of human involvement in the e-coaching process. This paper addresses this issue and describes an empirical ‘Wizard of Oz’ study in which coachees (N=82) were coached to regularly climb the stairs by either a human coach (N=20) or the autonomous e-coaching system eMate. However, some coachees were deceived into thinking that they received one type of coaching (human or computerized), while in reality they received the other. Results show that the coaching was equally effective in all groups, but suggest that people who believed to be coached by a human coach judged the coaching to be more influential. Finally, no difference was found in how trustworthy coachees found their coach for the different types of coaches.