Goal-setting is often used in eHealth applications for behavior change as it motivates and helps to stay focused on a desired outcome. However, people also need to be confident to reach their goals. In our now-published paper in the Journal of Medical Systems, we describe our findings on showing personalized examples from other people who reached a running or walking goal (i.e., vicarious experiences) in a goal-setting dialog for physical activity with a virtual coach. We assess the effect of these personalized examples on people's self-efficacy as well as their perceived motivational impact. Moreover, we qualitatively analyze what people found motivating about the examples from other people they saw. We further examine people's acceptance of the virtual coach. The paper is available here: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10916-022-01899-9. The underlying data and analysis code can be found here: https://doi.org/10.4121/21806868.v1. 

Academic partners

Leids Universitair Medisch Centrum
Universiteit Leiden
Technische Universiteit Delft
Universiteit Twente
eScience Center
Trimbos