According to recent studies, procrastination can be divided into subtypes: active and passive procrastination. While passive procrastinaton refers to the traditional sense of procrastination (i.e., behavioral delay, task aversiveness, lack of self-reg...
According to recent studies, procrastination can be divided into subtypes: active and passive procrastination. While passive procrastinaton refers to the traditional sense of procrastination (i.e., behavioral delay, task aversiveness, lack of self-regulated performance), active procrastination is more deliberate procrastination to achieve the goal more efficiently (i.e. working under pressure, making deliberate decisions). However, studies comparing those two groups have failed to find conclusive difference in psychological characteristics.
Therefore, the current study investigated differences in psychological factors including self-discrepancy, fear of failure, depression and anxiety among active procrastination group, passive procrastination group and non-procrastination group. For this purpose, questionnaires including General Procrastination(GP) and Active Procrastination Scale(APS) were administered to 506 undergraduate students, who were categorized as non-procrastination group(NP, N=233), active procrastination group(AP, N=100), and passive procrastination group(PP, N=133). Statistical analysis using ANOVA showed that no difference in age, gender, and education between groups. However, the grade point average(GPA) of PP group were statistically lower compared to NP and AP group.
In terms of psychological characteristics, PP group showed increased self-discrepancy, fear of failure, depression and anxiety. NP and AP group showed only statistical difference in fear of failure, where AP experiences more fear of failure than NP.
To further investigate how psychological factors affect procrastination, influence of self-discrepancy and fear of failure and moderating effects of emotion regulation were tested with regression analysis. As a result, the moderating effect of emotion regulation strategy was found in relationship between fear of failure and procrastination.
The current study has implications that it investigated the demographic, academic and psychological characteristics between AP, PP and GP group. Furthermore, this study put emphasis on emotion regulation strategies to enhance active procrastination while reducing passive procrastination caused by fear of failure. Limitations of present study and suggestions for future investigation were discussed.