The word captology is derived from the first four initials of the words, Computers As Persuasive Technologies, and it's trickling into the vocabulary of learning professionals, for good reason.

The concepts and principles of captology relate directly to electronic performance improvement, automated change management, and workflow-based e-learning. Dr. B. J. Fogg, director of Stanford's Persuasive Technology Laboratories and the leading proponent of captology, defines persuasion as "an attempt to shape, reinforce, or change behaviors, feelings, or thoughts about an issue, object, or action." To that end, captology is one of many new design frameworks that map to new workflow-based learning products, which are characterized by task-specific, real-time contextual content and simulation embedded in the workflow.

Three captology design principles that probably have the most impact on the development of these new learning technologies are tailoring, simulation, and tunneling. Business process management systems and new transactional portals route information and tasks tailored specifically to workers based on their job role and the task at hand. Simulation is the most salient aspect of business process modeling and next-generation learning content.

The most compelling examples of tailored simulation are virtual coaches and wizards that are embedded in the contextual workflow. Tunneling is the use of these embedded wizards to persuade workers to take particular paths and actions based on job roles and business rules. Business rule engines are efficient tunneling technologies. Indeliq and Hyperwave both have business rule engines embedded in their learning platforms.

Professor Fogg advocates focusing on captology technologies that are specialized, distributed or embedded.

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