Top Research Papers on Procrastination

Procrastination is defined as postponing a task, anticipating adverse consequences in the future. In contrast, D. A. Rosenbaum and colleagues introduced the concept of “precrastination” in 2014, defining it as people doing a task early even when involving physical cost because they desire to minimize their cognitive load. This study aimed to organize and expand the new concept and advance understanding of precrastination in everyday situations and of the associations between precrastination and self‐control. Using the scenario assumption method, we examined whether people would precrastinate o...

Putting things off as long as possible (procrastination) is a well-known tendency. Less well known is the tendency to attempt to get things done as soon as possible, even if that involves extra effort (precrastination). Since its discovery in 2014, precrastination has been demonstrated in humans and animals and has recently been revealed in an analogous tendency called the mere-urgency effect. Trying to get things done as soon as one can may reflect optimal foraging, but another less obvious factor may also contribute—reducing cognitive demands associated with having to remember what to do whe...

Procrastination is prevalent and pernicious but not entirely understood, motivating this empirical and theoretical review. The review attempts to be exhaustive, drawing upon correlational, experimental, and qualitative findings. Summarizing 648 correlations, a meta-analysis of procrastination’s causes and effects reveals that neuroticism, rebelliousness, and sensationseeking show only a weak connection. Strong and consistent predictors of procrastination were task aversiveness, task delay, self-efficacy, impulsiveness, as well as conscientiousness and its facets of self-control, distractibilit...

Procrastination is letting the low-priority tasks get in the way of high-priority ones. It's socializing with colleagues when you know that important work project is due soon, watching TV instead of doing your household chores, or talking about superficial things with your partner rather than discussing your relationship concerns. CAUSES Like other habits, there are two general causes. The first is the " crooked thinking " we employ to justify our behavior. The second source is our behavioral patterns. A closer look at our crooked thinking reveals three major issues in delaying tactics-perfect...

TIME.09 Procrastination – Causes and Cures Causes of Procrastination 1. Acceptance of another’s goals or Lack of Relevance – if it is not yours, it is not likely to be important to you. 2. Perfectionism – Afraid to start something for fear it will not turn out perfectly. 3. Anxiety over what others think – Afraid others will think less of you when they see your finished product. 4. Fear of the unknown – Afraid to try something you never did before 5. Thinking you do not have the skills Causes 2 – 5 are fear based. The procrastinator would rather that others think he lacks effort than that he l...

Na akademsko odgađanje vecina autora gleda kao na iskljucivo negativan fenomen, no Chu i Choi (2005) uvode podjelu na pasivno i aktivno odgađanje. Pasivni odgađaci nemaju namjeru odgađanja, no ipak cesto odgađaju zadatke i obaveze jer nisu sposobni djelovati u skladu sa svojim odlukama. S druge strane, aktivni odgađaci namjerno odgađaju rjesavanje obaveza i usmjeravaju pažnju na druge važne aktivnosti te mogu djelovati u skladu sa svojim odlukama. Cilj ovog istraživanja bio je provjeriti faktorsku strukturu Upitnika aktivnog odgađanja te utvrditi postoji li razlika između aktivnog i pasivnog a...

Introducing a novel domain in which procrastinators experience problems, bedtime procrastination appears to be a prevalent and relevant issue that is associated with getting insufficient sleep.

Procrastination, the act or tendency of putting things off that should be done today until tomorrow, has recently become a field of interest in the study of academic underachievement. In constructing tests for the measurement of procrastination, and in comparing test scores with self‐attributions of reasons for procrastination, an unexpected discrepancy has been observed between fear of failure as a prominent reason for procrastination and test fear of failure being unrelated to procrastination. This study was meant to clarify this discrepancy. Students who procrastinate generally endorse many...

Procrastination is a self‐regulatory failure, whose costs are debated. Here, we establish its impact in the workplace. Using an Internet sample, we assessed 22,053 individuals in terms of their sex, employment status, employment duration, income, occupational attainment and level of procrastination. High levels of procrastination is associated with lower salaries, shorter durations of employment, and a greater likelihood of being unemployed or under employed rather than working full‐time. Also, procrastination partially mediates sex's relationship with these work variables. Women tend to procr...

Abstract We experimentally study strategic procrastination in a dynamic team environment. Two team members work for a finite number of periods on a joint project. The project’s success probability depends on the effort provided by both group members. Payment is conditional on finishing the project successfully. Between treatments, we vary whether both agents are free to choose their effort level or only a single agent can do so. If only one agent can choose effort, the effort of the other member is exogenously fixed; either to providing effort only shortly before the deadline or to providing e...

High school and undergraduate students claimed to be nearly always or always procrastinator on studying for exams, while graduate students procrastinate more on writing term papers.

The present research intended to examine the outcomes of active and passive procrastination among Pakistani educated adolescents via online data collection. To meet the objective measures concerning active and passive procrastination (Aziz & Tariq, 2013; Choi & Moran, 2009; Chu & Choi, 2005), depression, anxiety, stress (Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995), and life satisfaction (Diener, Emmons, Larsen, & Griffin, 1985) were uploaded on a website in English and Urdu. Overall 223 educated Pakistani adolescent participated via online in the study (M = 19 years, SD = 5.19; age range 13-21 years). The prel...

Research over the past decades has shown that procrastination is an instance of self-regulation failure with deleterious consequences. Surprisingly, Chu and Choi (2005) have coined a construct called active procrastination emphasizing that procrastination can lead to positive outcomes despite the deferral of tasks on purpose until the last minute. The present study examined the construct validity of active procrastination. Using important antecedents (e.g., self-regulation, intention-action gap), correlates (e.g., self-efficacy beliefs, conscientiousness) and related outcomes of procrastinatio...

Procrastination is a long-term puzzle for everyone, which is deeply rooted in our life, and it could be affecting our normal life. This paper will discover how Neuroscience, a recent trend in the field of Science, could play a role in minimalizing procrastination. It is set to reveal the inside structure of the human brain and discover what organs are important to understand the mystery of procrastination. Specifically, this paper will introduce the contrasting features of the prefrontal cortex and limbic system, and it will guide us to understand how different parts of the brain could act aga...

This paper examines di ff erent theories on the reasons why students procras ti nate on their academic assignments. Although the fear of failure, self ‐ regulatory failures and low self ‐ e ffi cacy have been linked to procras ti na ti on among students, recent research suggests these theories aren't complete because they don't account for task aversiveness or the hyperbolic discoun ti ng of ti me. The Temporal Mo ti va ti on Theory is the most valid theory of procras ti na ti on today because it incorporates the self ‐ regulatory and self ‐ e ffi cacy theories and accounts for task aversiveness an...

Overview/Description Procrastination is rampant in today’s business world. Sure, it’s easy to blame others for your inability to get things done—demanding bosses, or coworkers who interrupt you for help. But be honest, how often is it your own fault? Are you simply putting off doing what will still be in your in-box tomorrow? Do you make statements such as: “I don’t have time to do it,” “It makes sense to do the smaller tasks first to get them out of the way,” “Once I get more energy, I can really focus on this.”? If so, there’s a strong possibility that you have fallen into the “Procrastinati...

The model of Kleinberg and Oren on time-inconsistent planning is extended, and the relative progress of the team members, with respect to their respective subtasks, motivates (or discourages) them to work harder, to model collaborative work.

The identification of this region confirms the close association between impulsivity and procrastination; however, a causal relationship has yet to be found.

This story describes the procrastination and work practices of an autoethnographer as she observes herself on the blank computer screen.

The Youth Homelessness Action Plan (YHAP) Discussion Paper has identified a number of key issues through consultations with young people and service providers. The YHAP Discussion Paper provides valuable and workable immediate responses to enhancing service provision to young people who are homeless.

We analyze the decision of individuals with time inconsistent preferences who undertake irreversible activities yielding either a current cost and a future benefit or a current benefit and a future cost. We first show that, when benefits come earlier than costs, the individual faces a coordination problem with himself that results in multiple, rankable equilibria. Some of these equilibria may exhibit rush, in the sense that the activity is undertaken 'too early' (i.e. with a negative payoff). Multiplicity explains why individuals succeed or not in avoiding temptations, depending on 'the degree...

Employees today need a push to encourage them to save more and to help them make the best investment decisions, according to research by the Resolution Foundation.

My aim in this chapter is to understand more precisely what kind of irrationality is involved in procrastination. I will argue that procrastination is one of the corresponding vices of an overlooked virtue, which I will call “practical judgment”. In the fi rst section, I provide the background model I will employ in my account of procrastination, the Policy as Action Model (PAM). Relying on this model, in the second section, I characterize a form of procrastination that will play a central role in my account of “long-term procrastination.” The third section defi nes the instrumental virtue of ...

There is a large literature in behavioral economics finding that people routinely override their long-term preferences due to the pull of immediate gratification. With this in mind, this paper develops a simple model of repeated procrastination that can be used to examine the efficacy of legal rules. Among other things, the model leads to the following counter-intuitive result: a person who from a long-term perspective believes that violating the law is economically worthwhile, may nonetheless repeatedly procrastinate following through with the planned misconduct. This sort of "time-inconsiste...

Hamlet,Shakespeare's masterpiece,has portrayed Hamlet a complicated image of a thinker, savior and isolato. Starting with Hamlet's "procrastination",this paper firstly analyzes the image and then explores the roots of the tragedy. It will help readers more fully understand the image and the efforts the Renais-sance advanced intellectuals made revolt against the old system unremittingly.

1. Putting yourself down You think and act as if you believe that you must perform virtually all important tasks perfectly or as nearly perfectly as possible. People usually do this to try to win the approval of others, as well as themselves. 2. Low frustration tolerance You act as if you believe that difficult or boring work which causes some discomfort or anxiety is unbearable. You may tell yourself that you shouldn’t have to do it or that you can’t stand it. Fear of the unknown often adds to or causes some anxiety. 3. Hostility You may consciously or unconsciously feel controlled and resent...

In this lecture I shall focus on situations involving repeated decisions with time inconsistent behavior. Although each choice may be close to maximizing and therefore result in only small losses, the cumulative effect of a series of repeated errors may be quite large. Thus, in my examples, decision makers are quite close to the intelligent, well-informed individuals usually assumed in economic analysis, but cumulatively they make seriously wrong decisions that do not occur in standard textbook economics. This lecture discusses and illustrates several "pathological" modes of individual and gro...

Drew on current research in cognitive science, tropes of procrastination and texts from ‘Hamlet’ - the greatest procrastinator of all time – to interrogate its complex manifestations in contemporary life.

Procrastination means putting off a difficult, delayable, important task in favor of something easier, quicker, and less anxiety-provoking. It also means delaying vital actions until the performance and result are less than they would have been if done in a timely manner. Similarly, blocking means that we stumble, delay, and panic in response to a demanding responsibility. Blocking typically occurs when we face public scrutiny (as in writing). In this revisionist and sometimes irreverent book, the author takes academic and professional psychologists to task for neglecting a pair of related pro...

The term Procrastination describes a complex disturbance in the process of controlling action and is associated with low self-regulation capacities. Especially among students for whom 75 percent report being negatively impacted by the tendency. The study at hand tests the theory that meditation supports self-relational capacities among students, and therefore leads to a reduction in procrastination behavior. Eight semi structured interviews were conducted with students experienced in meditation (N=8, age= 20-25 years). The students were instructed to reflect on their meditation practice and it...

In this paper I analyze a dynamic moral hazard problem in teams with imperfect monitoring in continuous time. In the model, players are working together to achieve a breakthrough in a project while facing a deadline. The effort needed to achieve such a breakthrough is unknown but players have a common prior about its distribution. Each player is only able to observe their own effort, not the effort of others. I characterize the optimal effort path for general distributions of breakthrough efforts and show that, in addition to free-riding, procrastination arises. Furthermore, in this model, pro...

In his everyday work the family physician sees many patients whose problems have been diagnosed but for whom postponement of an active treatment plan is indicated, so he must prescribe procrastination in a carefully planned way.

This paper has been withdrawn by the author because the author does not believe it is safe to proceed with publication.

Objective To explore the relationship among parenting style and paocrastination in the junior school students.Methods Totally 488 students were surveyed with EMBU and Aitkent procrastination inventory(AIP),and use the SPSS to analyzed the data by descriptive statistic,correlation analysis and Regression analysis.Results There was significant difference between gender in the procrastination of students and parents' love and there were significant positive correlations among the parcrastination and father's deny,father's punishment,father's excessinve protection,mother's deny and mother's punish...

Abstract. The short form of the General Procrastination Scale (GPS-K; Klingsieck & Fries, 2012 ; Lay, 1986 ) is a reliable self-report scale measuring general procrastination. The presumed one-dimensional factor structure of the scale, however, has never been examined. Thus, the purposes of this representative study were to examine its dimensionality and factorial invariance across age and sex, and to provide norm values of the German general population. The GPS-K was administered to a representative community sample ( N = 2,527; age range 14–95 years). A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was...

Experiments show that in the presence of quantum entanglement (in which outcomes of measurements are tied together), it is possible to hold off making a decision, even if events seem to have already made one.

Time management directly correlates to student success and persistence in all modalities, but particularly in distance learning. Teaching the study skills and time management tools students need to succeed in the challenging online environment builds confidence, improves success rates, and increases retention. Faculty must prepare students for success both in the classroom and in their future professional careers. Time management tools are necessary in any course, and faculty should teach time management tools along with course-specific content and outcomes; this will improve time management a...

Porcrastination not only complicates the plot of the tragedy but enriches its characterizaton.Hamlet delays his revenge over and over again mainly because of his complicated character,especially his overriding concern with the pervasive blight within the cosmos,along with the dialectic he and other people form on concepts.

The procrastination approach to the treatment of ambiguity, particularly in the context of natural language interfaces, is presented and a collection of structures that describe sets of possible interpretations efficiently are developed.

Procrastination is a pervasive problem both inside and outside academia, incurring economic and personal costs that can often be easily avoided avoided. While in many cases, students seem to do well in spite of procrastination, the evidence suggests that even those not "at-risk," and perhaps even doing well by most standards, would significantly improve their academic outcomes if they could take measures against procrastinating.

   Procrastination is one of the most researched and polemized topics of interest to domestic and foreign scientists due to its widespread prevalence among students and adults. The authors agree that syste matic violation of deadlines for necessary tasks completion causes subjective discomfort, but this behavior is regularly manifested in ordinary life, becoming “chronic” in nature.   The purpose of the study is to analyze the phenomenon of procrastination.   The work was based on the theoretical analysis of literature, generalization, empirical research results interpretation, conducted on th...

The article discusses the results of an empirical study on the influence of certain traits of HEXACO personality, as well as coping strategies, reflection, and emotional patterns on procrastination behavior. The study aims to test hypotheses about the differences in the severity of these characteristics among individuals with varying levels of procrastination, as well as to identify predictors of procrastination within these characteristics. The authors found out that quasi­reflection and a lack of emotional control (positive predictors) as well as conscientiousness and planning (negative pred...

This paper presents a general stochastic model for procrastination with respect to a deadline. The model establishes a universal procrastination pattern that follows an inverse power-law: if the time remaining to the deadline is r then the response is , where ϵ is a positive exponent. The model further establishes that the exponent value , which yields the harmonic response , stands out as special and distinguishable. The theoretical results of the model are shown to be in perfect accord with recent empirical findings.

Less than a decade ago, “rational choice theory” seemed oddly impervious to criticism. Hundreds of books, articles and studies were published every year, attacking the theory from every angle, yet it continued to attract new converts. How times have changed! The “anomalies” that Richard Thaler once blithely cataloged for the Journal of Economic Perspectives are now widely regarded, not as curious deviations from the norm, but as falsifying counterexamples to the entire project of neoclassical economics. The work of experimental game theorists has perhaps been the most influential in showing th...

of Management, University of California, Los Angeles (e-mail: suzanne. shu@anderson.ucla.edu). Ayelet Gneezy is Assistant Professor of Marketing, Rady School of Management, University of California, San Diego (e-mail: agneezy@ucsd.edu). This article is based in part on Suzanne Shu’s doctoral dissertation. The authors thank the excellent JMR review team; Gal Zauberman; and dissertation committee members Richard Thaler, George Wu, Yuval Rottenstreich, and France Leclerc for their insightful comments and guidance. They also thank Alessandro Pevitero, the Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego, t...

A model where a person chooses from a menu of options and is partially aware of her self-control problems is developed, and this menu model replicates earlier results and generates new ones.

This work proposes an elegant solution to the general problem of getting stuff done, the well-known STUFF problem, and calls it anticipatory procrastination, finding empirical evidence that such an approach can work.

We examine how principals should design incentives to induce time-inconsistent procrastinating agents to complete tasks efficiently. Delay is costly to the principal, but the agent faces stochastic costs of completing the task, and efficiency requires waiting when costs are high. If the principal knows the task-cost distribution, she can always achieve first-best efficiency. If the agent has private information, the principal can induce first-best efficiency for time-consistent agents, but often cannot for procrastinators. We show that second-best optimal incentives for procrastinators typical...

_____________________ Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Safia Afzal, Alumni, National Institute of Psychology, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad-Pakistan. Email: safiaafzal786@gmail.com Humaira Jami, PhD, Assistant Professor, National Institute of Psychology, Quaid-iAzam University, Islamabad-Pakistan. Email: jami@nip.edu.pk Prevalence of Academic Procrastination and Reasons for Academic Procrastination in University Students

Academic procrastination (students’ tendency to postpone and/or avoid an  academic task) is a widely extended phenomenon in education, especially among university students. However, there is still little research on this topic and no single validated and widely accepted instrument to measure procrastination levels at university level in Spain has been developed yet. This study aimed to cover this gap and develop a procrastionation scale adapted from two existing instruments and to measure the procrastination tendencies of a sample of 529 students from two different universities. The results sh...