International Coaching Psychology Review, 4.2, September 2009

John Franklin & Justin Doran
Discussion
This study was undertaken to evaluate the
extent to which the effects of participating in
a co-coaching programme generalised
beyond self-report measures to independently
assessed objective performance, in this
case performance in university exams and
assessments. Although both conditions were
structurally identical in terms of the number
and duration of sessions, they had somewhat
different content and very different outcomes.
The Self-regulation condition which
focused on study and coping skills only had a
significant effect on increasing academic
self-efficacy and resilience, with a small
overall effect size across the seven
dependent measures of .43. In contrast, the
PAAL condition was associated with significant
increases in all the dependent variables,
including academic performance, and produced
a large overall effect size of .93. These
somewhat surprising results are worthy of
examination.
Both conditions were labouring under a
number of disadvantages with respect to
achieving significant differences or large
effects. The small numbers in each condition
militated against significance and made
it difficult to detect effects. Similarly, since
both co-coaching programmes only began in
week seven of a 13-week semester, they could
only influence academic work submitted in
the second half of the semester. In view of
this, it is surprising that those in the PAAL
condition achieved an academic mark
almost 10 per cent higher than those in the
no treatment control group. Under these
constraints, an effect size of .61 is impressive.
The Self-regulation condition clearly also
worked as it produced an effect size with
respect to resilience and self-efficacy which
was not significantly less than that of the
PAAL condition. The surprise was that it did
not produce a significant effect with respect
to hope, even though this scale directly
measures the very skills which are at the
heart of the self-regulation condition. This
result may in part be explained by the
greater sensitivity of the resilience scale,
which contains 33 items, where as the Hope
scale only contains six items.
With respect to self-compassion and
belief in the incremental theory of change,
the PAAL condition was at a very considerable
advantage as these concepts were
expressly targeted in this coaching condition.
Accordingly, it comes as no surprise
that the PAAL coaching programme produced
highly significant increases in both
self-compassion and endorsement of the
incremental theory of change. The effect
size with respect to the later was 1.42, which
represents an extremely large effect. All the
other effect sizes were in the range .61 to
1.24, and were moderate or large in size. The
possible effects of these changes on academic
performance and their origin within
the PAAL model of coaching warrant some
attention.
The PAAL model of change and self-development
differs from the traditional model of
coaching in strategically focusing attention on
the readiness of the client to undertake those
actions which will lead to the achievement of
their goals and ultimate objective. Particular
attention is directed to identifying and
resolving barriers to change, chief amongst
them being the belief that one can grow their
intelligence (the analogy is often made to
exercise developing a muscle) and change
their behaviour through strategically targeted
effort. In a series of studies, Dweck and colleagues
has found that belief in a growth
mindset is associated with heightened motivation,
sustained effort and a greater capacity to
recover from failure and discouragement
(Blackwell, Trzesniewski & Dweck, 2007;
Dweck, 2006). The PAAL model also directly
targets barriers relating to categorical
thinking, self-acceptance, self-criticism, selfworth
and perfectionism, and seeks to identify
and resolve any additional idiosyncratic
factors which may represent an impediment
to change, personal growth and academic
achievement. This focus on issues beyond the
study and coping skills covered in the Self-regulation
condition may account for the greater
efficacy of the PAAL coaching condition.
140 International Coaching Psychology Review ● Vol. 4 No. 2 September 2009