Validating and Dialectical Coaching Strategies in a Virtual Coach for Obese Emotional Eaters 57 3 Introduction Obesity has become a major societal problem worldwide [1-3]. The main reason for severe overweight is an excessive intake of energy, in relation with the individual needs of a human body. Obesity is associated with poor eating habits and/or a sedentary lifestyle. A significant part of the obese population (40%) overeat due to negative emotions [4]. They suffer from food cravings and give in to food binges in response to high negative feelings or stress. There is little attention to the personal needs of emotional eaters when it comes to existing health interventions [5-7]. Current face- to-face treatments have insufficient recognition to affect regulation. There is a need for self-management support and personalised coaching for emotional eaters to train themselves in recognising and self-regulating their emotions [8-9]. This paper is structured as follows: In Background, we discuss the theoretical underpinnings of dialectical behaviour therapy and persuasive coaching strategies. Next, in Design rationale for a personalised virtual coach, we elaborate on the design rationale of a personalized virtual coach. And in Approach and methodology we present the design of the research protocol. We finish this paper in Discussion, conclusion and future work with a discussion on the expected contributions of this research study, conclusion, and future work. Background Virtual coaching systems form a broad and vivid research area [10-13]. Since chatbot Eliza was invented by Joseph Weizenbaum [14], many new studies have emerged. Over the last years, virtual coaches have been developed for behaviour change support, healthy lifestyle, and physical activity support [15-19]. Existing virtual coach applications lack systematic evaluation of coaching strategies and usually function as (tele) monitoring systems, limited to giving general feedback to the user on achieved goals and accomplished (online) assignments [20]. This paper presents the research protocol and design rationale for a personalised coaching system and the evaluation of persuasive coaching strategies for emotional eaters based on the Dialectical Behavior Therapy and Persuasive Technology. This research study is a continuation of a previous study on the design and development of emotion-enriched personas [9]. The objective of developing a personalised virtual coach for obese emotional eaters is to raise their awareness about emotions, to enhance a positive change of attitude towards accepting the negative emotions they experience, and to accomplish a balance in body weight.
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