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An e-coaching ecosystem: design and effectiveness analysis of the engagement of remote coaching on athletes

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Abstract

Nowadays, the use of mobile applications and wearable technologies to support and encourage an active lifestyle has become widespread. Several studies put in evidence that the usage of these kinds of support has to be monitored by high-qualified figures, to favor a safe and a long-term adherence to training routines. In order to investigate the impact of these professionals, this work sets out to provide an overview and an evaluation of an e-coaching ecosystem specifically designed for runners. The platform supports and guides people towards an active lifestyle by stimulating their motivation to exercise through the engagement provided by the interactions between users and human trainers. In this study, we investigate the effectiveness of the support offered by the human trainers and the engagement of the users. The results show that the support of human qualified trainers is crucial. Users tend to be more engaged to train when their trainings are developed and remotely supervised by a human coach. This has resulted in more workout sessions performed with respect to users exercising by following standard or self-made routines without direct professional supervision. Our findings show that e-coaching systems should develop their coaching protocols always taking into account the effectiveness of the support of qualified professionals over completely automated approaches.

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Notes

  1. http://www.statista.com/statistics/276623/number-of-apps-available-in-leading-app-stores

  2. http://venturebeat.com/2013/04/03/the-mobile-war-is-over-and-the-app-has-won-80-of-mobile-time-spent-in-apps

  3. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.xibio.everywhererun

  4. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/u4fit/id1006387680

  5. Note that a subscription has a duration of 1 month and no renewal requirements.

  6. An activity represents the basic building block of a workout session. It expresses a single type of exercise, as for example, “run for 3km at a pace of 6 minutes per km.”

  7. Note that not every combination is clearly possible. For example, it is not possible to create a distance-speed activity with a label of type rest.

  8. Note again that the subscription to the personal training service can be renewed from month to month.

  9. The customer care sends an email to new users 3 weeks after their first login if they do not subscribe to the personal training service, to convince them to give it a try.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Alessio Demurtas, Marika Cappai, Luca Mancosu, Giordano Sini, and Stefano Amico for their contribution in this research work and the reviewers for their invaluable suggestions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Matematica e Informatica, Università di Cagliari, Via Ospedale 72, 09124, Cagliari, Italy

    Ludovico Boratto, Salvatore Carta, Fabrizio Mulas & Paolo Pilloni

  2. Digital Humanities - Eurecat, Avinguda Diagonal 177, 8th Floor, 08018, Barcelona, Spain

    Ludovico Boratto

Authors
  1. Ludovico Boratto
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  2. Salvatore Carta
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  3. Fabrizio Mulas
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  4. Paolo Pilloni
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ludovico Boratto.

Additional information

This work is partially funded by Regione Sardegna under project NOMAD (Next generation Open Mobile Apps Development), through PIA - Pacchetti Integrati di Agevolazione “Industria Artigianato e Servizi” (annualità 2013).

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Boratto, L., Carta, S., Mulas, F. et al. An e-coaching ecosystem: design and effectiveness analysis of the engagement of remote coaching on athletes. Pers Ubiquit Comput 21, 689–704 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00779-017-1026-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00779-017-1026-0

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