The measurement and nature of procrastination.

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Procrastination is prevalent and pernicious but poorly understood. Presently, there are four research deficits to be addressed. First, the definition of procrastination is uncertain, limiting the construct validity of assessments. Second, its performance effects are uncertain, with arguments indicating beneficial and detrimental outcomes. Third, treatments for procrastination are limited with many promising options relatively unexplored. Fourth, there is no widely accepted theory of procrastination. Using 217 undergraduate students taking a computerized course taught as a personalized system of instruction, this correlational study attempted to address these points.
Procrastination appears to be an intended action that is voluntarily delayed, despite expectations that this delay will fail to maximize one's utility. Since no previous procrastination indices clearly reflect this definition, new ones were developed. Several self-report and observed measures were successfully created. Reliabilities were above .80 and convergent and divergent validity was appropriate: correlating as expected with conscientiousness and its facets but not with general mental ability (GMA; as reflected in American College Test scores) and neuroticism. However, the self-report measures did appear to be contaminated by context or method effects, while the observed measure was unable to unambiguously assess rationality.
Using these measures, procrastination was a consistent predictor of performance, incremental to GMA and conscientiousness, though having both positive and negative effects. Positively, procrastinators are able to do a tremendous amount of work just before a deadline. Negatively, despite this end-productivity, overall performance was significantly impaired. Of note, the task moderates effects considerably.
Several self-regulatory skills relevant to procrastination were investigated with five notable effects. Energy Regulation, Automaticity, Temptation Attention Control, and Goal Attention Control all independently predicted procrastination, accounting for over 70% of the variance in total. Also, Positive Goal Fantasy only had an effect in conjunction with Goal Attention Control, confirming Oettingen's (1996) “gap” effect.
Finally, the theory of picoeconomics was assessed with several supportive findings. As expected, procrastinators demonstrated an intention-action gap, procrastinating activities are related to personality traits, and proximity to temptation and impulsiveness predict procrastination. Continued research into the prediction and treatment of procrastination should not be delayed, especially since its prevalence appears to be growing.