Chapter 2 32 dieting episode. This is an example of the so-called ‘yo-yo effect’ in health behaviour [16-17]. It is highly conceivable that this is the cause of an accumulation of disappointments and a growing lack of confidence that one will ever succeed. Emotional eaters and eHealth Evidence suggests that eHealth and Cognitive Behaviour Therapy can be just as effective as face-to-face treatments. Evidence-based therapeutic procedures can be delivered online [18]. In addition, emotional eaters need personalised anonymous support that is always available. Not only do emotional eaters need moral support, but a personalised self-management support could also clear away obstacles that keep emotional eaters away from face-to-face contact with a therapist. Obese emotional eaters form a particularly vulnerable group of people. To avoid further setbacks, they need support they can rely on, that is both trustworthy and promising, but realistic, and that matches with their needs. Such support needs to be accessible and comfortable so that one feels safe and secure. There is a need for supportive training programs for this specific target group of emotional eaters. This paper presents a design case study aimed at the development of a personalised virtual mHealth coach application for self-management support of young adult emotional eaters who are obese. The paper is structured as follows. In Related work, related work on online eHealth interventions for emotional eaters and obesity is discussed. Next, in Approach and Methods the approach and methods are presented for developing Personas and applying them to guide the design process. In Results the results are presented including a use case scenario and the first prototype of the ‘Denk je zèlf!’ virtual coach. Finally, a discussion and conclusions are presented in Conclusions and discussion. Related work Dialectical Behaviour Therapy Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) is a new way of treating emotional eating behaviour. DBT was originally designed to help people who are suffering from Borderline Personality Disorder [19]. The therapy focuses on the process of ‘reduction of ineffective action tendencies linked with dysregulated emotions’ [20]. Recent research into the deployment of Dialectical Behaviour Therapy shows positive results in weight loss management and weight maintenance in obese emotional eaters [13]. DBT might be successful in patients where insufficient progress was achieved using Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) [12,
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