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Coaching approaches

Self-distancing coaching

Self-distancing coaching helps you look at a difficult experience from a step back, for example by describing it in the third person, rather than from inside the feeling. Research led by Ethan Kross and Özlem Ayduk links self-distancing with adaptive self-reflection, which the authors contrast with rumination. Most of that work is experimental. No clinical trial or meta-analysis of the coaching form turned up in the sources checked, so the evidence covers the underlying technique rather than coaching delivered this way.

The principles underneath

Third-person self-talk

Describing your own experience using your name or 'you' creates some distance from it. Kross and colleagues (2014) examined whether the form of self-talk affects regulation, not only its content.

Temporal distance

Thinking about an event as it may look in months, rather than as it feels today, is another way to step back. Kross and Ayduk (2017) review self-distancing as a general approach to reflection. The sources checked do not test this temporal form on its own.

Observer perspective

Seeing an event from an observer's vantage point, rather than from inside it, is the mechanism Ayduk and Kross (2010) studied under spontaneous self-distancing. The advise-a-friend frame is one way a coach can invite that shift. The sources checked do not test that frame on its own.

What it is

A self-distancing conversation asks you to describe a difficult event as if you were looking at it from outside. The coach may ask you to use your own name or 'you' instead of 'I', to picture the event from further away in time, or to think about what you would tell a friend. The point is to change your vantage point, so that the event can be reflected on rather than relived.

Reflecting on a painful event can either help you make sense of it or keep you stuck in it. The approach is built to make the first more likely. It is principle-first, and the coaching form has not been tested as a whole in the sources checked.

Where it comes from

The research is led by Ethan Kross and Özlem Ayduk. Ayduk and Kross (2010) studied spontaneous self-distancing and its link to adaptive self-reflection. Kross and Ayduk (2011) reviewed the case that self-distancing helps people make meaning out of negative experiences.

Kross and colleagues (2014) examined how the form of self-talk matters for regulation. Kross and Ayduk (2017) reviewed the wider research on self-distancing. Park, Ayduk and Kross (2016) found that expressive writing can promote self-distancing.

How a session runs

  1. The coach asks you to describe a recent difficult event in a few sentences, the way you would describe it in your own words.
  2. The coach asks you to say what happened using a third-person frame, such as your own name.
  3. The coach asks what the situation looks like from a step back, as though you were advising someone you care about.
  4. The coach asks what you notice now that you did not feel at first, and which question is still open.
  5. Together you choose one small step that follows from that view, and name when you will try it.
  6. In the next session, the coach starts with how the step went, and whether the distance held when the feeling returned.

When it tends to fit

  • You are replaying an argument, and each replay feels more personal, so you cannot see the event itself.
  • A friend's advice sounds obvious to you, but you cannot apply it to your own situation while you are in it.
  • A conversation you dread is coming up, and you want a calmer view of what you are trying to achieve in it.

What the research shows

Evidence: Some peer-reviewed studies

Self-distancing has been studied mainly in randomised laboratory experiments and in reviews, not in clinical trials, so the evidence rating rests on that laboratory work. Ayduk and Kross (2010) studied spontaneous self-distancing and adaptive self-reflection. Kross and colleagues (2014) report seven studies on how the form of self-talk matters for regulation, one of them a meta-analysis. Kross and Ayduk (2011) argue, with evidence from several levels of analysis, that self-distancing helps people reflect on negative experiences without the rumination that often follows attempts to make sense of them. Kross and Ayduk (2017) review the wider research. Park, Ayduk and Kross (2016) randomly assigned participants to write about a distressing experience or about a neutral topic, and found that the expressive writing promoted self-distancing. No meta-analysis or trial of coaching built on self-distancing turned up in the sources checked.

Untested combination. Each part above has its own research; this way of combining them has not been tested as a whole.

Where the evidence is thin: The studies cited are experimental or review work, not clinical trials of coaching. Effects on distress outside the laboratory are less established in these sources, and the coaching form has not been tested separately.

Sources

  1. Ayduk, Ö., & Kross, E. (2010). From a distance: Implications of spontaneous self-distancing for adaptive self-reflection. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
  2. Kross, E., & Ayduk, Ö. (2011). Making Meaning out of Negative Experiences by Self-Distancing. Current Directions in Psychological Science.
  3. Kross, E., Bruehlman-Senecal, E., Park, J., Burson, A., Dougherty, A., Shablack, H., Bremner, R., Moser, J., & Ayduk, Ö. (2014). Self-talk as a regulatory mechanism: How you do it matters. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
  4. Kross, E., & Ayduk, Ö. (2017). Self-Distancing. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology.
  5. Park, J., Ayduk, Ö., & Kross, E. (2016). Stepping back to move forward: Expressive writing promotes self-distancing. Emotion.

Where it stops

Stepping back can feel like being asked to calm down about something that matters, and it can make a real hurt feel minimized. A coach who helps you step back should first make sure you have been heard.

Distance is the wrong tool for feelings tied to trauma, abuse, or immediate danger. Those need a trained therapist, and reflection can reopen them.

If the distance turns into numbness, dissociation, or a sense that things are not real, stop and speak to a qualified professional.

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