Cause and Effect -- Procrastination Essay

     Procrastination is something that you don’t naturally have an innate ability to do. It is often brought on by finding ways

Besides this omission by Kalat, he still provided an accurate and detailed account of the research article written by Ariely and Wertenbroch. This article is essential in understanding procrastination and answered throughly the three questions it posed. 1.) Are people willing to impose deadlines, with substantial consequences if they are not met, on themselves: yes. 2.) Are these self-imposed deadlines actually helpful in improving overall performance:

People procrastinate because they are afraid to fail, they have poor time management, they avoid things that seem difficult or they feel depressed or they feel guilty. Some people believe that other procrastinate out of laziness or lack of discipline, but I know there are perfectionists that often procrastinate as well. For example, a perfectionist may put off writing a paper until the night before it is due and then they will have an excuse saying, “I restarted because I didn’t like what I had written.”. Another example is that some philosophers and scientists, such that Aristotle questioned if time even exists, and Einstein believed that time was a muddle in which the past, present and future were only illusions.

Thesis: Procrastination is the main result of disorganization whether it’s at home, work or school.

Attention Getter: A famous author by the name of Wayne Dyer once said, “Procrastination is one of the most common and deadliest of diseases and its toll on success and happiness is incredibly heavy.”(1) In todays society it seems as if procrastination has become a normal and acceptable thing to do. It is often joked about amongst schoolmates and co-workers around the world. Nothing seems to get done until it absolutely needs to get done, then everyone runs around getting things done quickly and often times inaccurately. The trouble with this mentality however is that some things will never get done because something will come up tomorrow or the next day and what you are putting off now gets pushed even further back. Today I will persuade you to stop this habit from continuing. I will be explaining the problems we face when dealing with procrastination as well as how to deal with it and actions you can take to prevent it in the future.

The problem of procrastination starts when a student waits until minutes before a class to study for a class. This may seem like a solution for students who are pressed for time; however, this doesn’t allow time for the information to be solidified and vital information can be lost. These behaviors form because students have found that in the past they were able to successfully pass the class by doing their homework literally hours before the projects deadline. This reckless learning may help pass the class, but doesn’t give the information the time needed to be solidified into memory. This reckless learning also produces effects within projects that are often below the students’ academic level and can cause

Deferring a task such as writing a paper does not necessarily mean a student's paper will turn out negatively. However, it also does not help a student to procrastinate because students builded up exceeding amounts of stress. According to, “Longitudinal Study Of Procrastination, Performance, Stress, and Health:The Costs and Benefits of Dawdling,” this study suggest that,“Even if the estimated time to do a paper is accurate, the student may perform worse because of unforeseen delays or

According to Semb, Glick and Spencer (1979), the level of procrastination increases as an individual stays longer in universities. It was stated by Ellis and Knaus (1977) that approximately, over 70% of college students engage in this activity. Undergraduates tend to start papers during the last minute; they fail to prioritize what should be accomplished first, and as a result, their academic performance is greatly affected. A detrimental effect on their studies leads to having poor grades and eventually, failure in class (Semb, et.al., 1979).

“A Dictionary of the English Language” written by Dr. Samuel Johnson, defined procrastination as “delay.” This common issue mostly around everyone. Many people struggle with deadlines every day. It is one of the largest problems seen in college counseling centers. (Grohol, Psy.D.)

Attention Getter: We all have been there when we wait until the last minute to write a paper or study for an exam. We struggle to get these things done and this struggle is called procrastination.

Many people believe that procrastination is derived completely from laziness but the culprit could be multiple things, including perfectionism. This can become a huge problem for perfectionists, especially perfectionist students. They most likely will overthink projects and put off getting started because they’re afraid they won’t be able to make them as perfect as they want them to be. Luckily this is a common issue among students and there are many different techniques to cope with it. Students can overcome procrastination due to perfectionism by setting S.M.A.R.T goals, creating detailed to-do lists, and by just getting started.

The questionnaire was posted online for psyc121 students of Victoria University of Wellington. “Please read each statement, and select the option that best describes how much you agree or disagree with each one” was the instruction given to the participants when completing a Pure Procrastination Scale (PPS) which was developed by Steel (2010). It had 12 items and on a one to five scale where one is strongly disagree and 5 is strongly agree. A statement “I generally delay before starting on work I have to do”. Higher scores meant higher levels of procrastination.

The principle of pleasure is mostly the main cause of procrastination. Every human prefers to do desirable tasks which are a source of joy for him instead of taking painstaking and stressful tasks on his head.

In my study, laziness is the most common reason student procrastinate. Timothy A Pychyl, a professor who specializes in the study of procrastination says “procrastinators often remark that they lack the motivation necessary to act. They have an intention to act, but they fail to act in a timely fashion even though they recognize

There are all always two types of students in this small world, first, the students that come ready to class with a three to five-page essay all proofread, nice and stapled with three transition sentences highlighted turned. Second, there are those students who come to class with not even half of a paper written out, unstapled, not a single transitional sentence highlighted and may have plenty of errors due to not proofreading the essay. Those second group of students are procrastinators, which are people who delay an assignment to do the task right before the deadline. Now, why do most of all 99.99% of school boys and girls procrastinate? Well, most people might have problems with lack of focus, or the person might be lazy and decide to