Research & Teaching
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Research Summary |
The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly Of Procrastinating
Article SummaryResponsible, mature adults get things done on time. But we all have a tendency to procrastinate now and then. Sometimes procrastination leads to late hours in the library, rushed assignments, stress, and even illness. But procrastination can't be all bad. Sure, you suffer right before the big deadline. But what about all the time before that? Instead of stressing out over an assignment for weeks, why not compress it into the end of the term? Tice and Baumeister investigated the relative costs and benefits of procrastination throughout the term. Students in a health psychology course completed procrastination scales and stress measures at the beginning and at the end of the term, and the date they handed in a term paper was recorded (students were told at the beginning of the course that they could receive an automatic extension to the due date for their paper). Students' scores on the procrastination scale were significantly related to the date the term paper was handed in (Tice and Baumeister used this as a behavioral measure of procrastination); students who handed the paper in later scored much higher on the procrastination scales than students who handed their papers in on an earlier date. Thus, the procrastination scales were valid measures of actual procrastination. Tice and Baumeister found interesting differences in the relationship between procrastination, stress, and health from the beginning of the term to the end of the term: Procrastinators reported significantly less stress and less illness at the beginning of the term than nonprocrastinators. This relationship was reversed at the end of the term, however, when procrastinators reported significantly more stress and illness than nonprocrastinators. Furthermore, overall stress levels and illness at the beginning and end of the term were higher for the procrastinators than for the nonprocrastinators. Procrastinators did not appear to benefit from the extra time to absorb course-related information either; procrastinators received significantly lower paper and exam grades than nonprocrastinators. Tice and Baumeister concluded that procrastinators received short-term benefits, in terms of less stress and illness at the beginning of the term, but greater long-term costs, in terms of much more stress and illness at the end of the term. In the long run, dawdling seems to be self-defeating. |