Academic procrastination is a highly prevalent issue among students of all education levels and is associated with negative outcomes across many domains (e.g., grades, and physical and mental health, Zentall, 2021). Currently, the majority of research on academic procrastination and its impact on educational outcomes implements questionnaires or self-reports, which are not cohesive with a behavior-analytic approach to procrastination. This situation limits a behavioral understanding of procrastination, and thus the development of effective related interventions. The present study aimed to contribute to this gap by testing the relationship between performance in a systematic replication of the academic discounting task (ADT) designed by Olsen et al. (2018) and three temporally-based measures of academic procrastination, which were collected via the students’ course progress in their Learning Management System platforms (D2L): (a) latency to turn assignments in hours (LTA; average time in hours that elapsed between when the assignments were made available by the instructor and the student turned them in), (b) latency of starting to work on assignments in hours (LWA; average time in hours it takes a student to start working on assignments after the instructor has made them available), and (c) time-to-deadline of submitting assignments in hours (TTD; average time in hours between the time assignments were due and when they were submitted). An association between TTD and ADT k values (a measure of rate of discounting), as well as an association between the three behavioral measures was found. Also, a significant difference in ADT k values between students who reported being employed versus unemployed students was observed. Lastly, a positive association between TTD and ADT k values, and a negative association between TTD and ADT AUC values was found; namely, high rates of discounting during the ADT predicted less postponement of assignment submission. These findings altogether provide additional support for the validity of the ADT as a measure of hyperbolic discounting of academic outcomes and the relevance of the three behavioral measures of academic procrastination. However, the unexpected finding that participants who submitted their assignments earlier displayed higher rates of academic discounting during the ADT does not support Olsen et al.’s prediction that delayed academic rewards are the key contributor to student procrastination. Alternatively, it seems that more research is needed to explore the role of aversive factors in procrastination (e.g., effort required to complete the assignment and/or difficulty of the assignment or probability that the hypothetical assignment would produce the related reinforcers, such as a good grade).

The prevalence of procrastination in the college environment is extremely high with estimates that 80–90% of college students procrastinate when completing academic tasks. Since it impacts the majority of college students, early identification of an individual’s personality traits and behavioral delay discounting tendencies that may contribute to academic procrastination can lead to improved productivity and overall, a better college experience. The present study reviews what is already known about the relationships between personality and delay discounting with academic procrastination. Based on the review of the current literature, this study strives to reinforce and extend what is known about the relationships between these variables, improve the methodology used to examine these relationships, and provide a possible neural basis of procrastination. The proposed study will be conducted with first-year undergraduate student participants who attend Scripps College, over three academic terms (three participant samples). The study materials consist of two self-report personality measures (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and Revised NEO Personality Inventory), a delay discounting task involving choices between hypothetical monetary rewards, and two measures of academic procrastination: a self-report measure (Procrastination Assessment Scale—Students) and a behavioral measure through course assignment submission. The study predicts that the typical academic procrastinator is introverted, perceptive, neurotic, and impulsive. In addition, an academic procrastinator has tendencies toward poor self-discipline, non-conscientious behavior, and preferences for discounted future rewards. Limitations of this study and future directions are also discussed.

This dissertation presents a literature review on procrastination and more specifically research involving the domain of academic procrastination, characteristics/traits academic procrastinators exhibit, and two different types of academic procrastinators. Even though a comprehensive theory has not been established, social cognitive theory, attribution theory, and motivation theories contribute to our understanding of academic procrastination. Studies that investigate prevalence of high school and college students who procrastinate in international settings, and more specifically in the United States, are reviewed, along with the literature on the relationship between academic procrastination and achievement. Research has demonstrated with relative consistency that academic procrastination has significant adverse effects on academic progress (Ferrari et al., 2005; Moon & Illingworth, 2005) and that high percentages of undergraduate college students self-report they engage in academic procrastination (Steel, 2007). The literature review is followed by an investigation that utilizes an adapted version of the Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students (Özer & Ferrari, 2011), a self-report instrument, to measure students’ academic procrastination. The purpose of this study was to investigate (a) the percentage of undergraduate college and high school students who self-report academic procrastination; (b) the frequency of academic procrastination among undergraduate college and high school students for the specific academic tasks of studying for exams, completing reading assignments, and writing papers; and (c) the relationship between academic procrastination and achievement of undergraduate college and high school students. Both on specific tasks and overall, significantly more college students report higher procrastination than high school students. Unexpectedly, this study did not find a significant relationship between academic procrastination and academic achievement, as measured by grade point average. This study highlights the importance of considering students’ age when examining academic procrastination.

The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between academic procrastination, self-regulation and positive thinking. Five hundreds and sixty three college students from Taiwan were selected by stratified sampling. The participants completed the ¡§Questionnaire of College Students' Academic Procrastination (QCSAP),¡¨ ¡§The Self-Regulation Questionnaire (SRQ)¡¨ and ¡§Positive Thinking Scale (PTS).¡¨ Descriptive statistics, t-tests, multivariate analysis of variance, pearson correlation, and path analysis were conducted on the quantitative data. In addition, content theme analysis was used to assess the motivation and disturbance of academic procrastination of college students. The findings from the study were summarized as follows: 1. Near 70% college students procrastinate their academic tasks and 57.4% students were bothered by academic procrastination. 2. Senior college students presented significantly higher score in "the ability to meet the deadline" than junior college students. 3. Students from National universities presented significantly lower score on ¡§active academic procrastination¡¨, ¡§ability to meet the deadline¡¨ and ¡§outcome satisfaction¡¨ than those from private universities and universities of technology. 4. Low GPA students had significantly higher scores on "fear of failure" and "task aversiveness" than those high GPA group counterparts. 5. Female college students had significantly higher score on "perfectionism" than their male counterparts. 6. Students from private universities of technology had significantly higher score on self-regulation and positive thinking than those from general universities. 7. Self-regulation was positively correlated with positive thinking. 8. Active academic procrastination can either directly predict college students¡¦ positive thinking or indirectly through self-regulation as a mediator. 9. Passive academic procrastination can significantly predict college students¡¦ self-regulation. 10. College students' academic procrastination motives were "task aversiveness," "laziness," "fear of failure" and "perfectionism." 11. The disturbance of academic procrastination of college students were categorized into three parts: "psychological," "physical," and "academic." Implications of these findings for higher education are discussed.

The purpose of the current study is to evaluate to determine whether or not two components of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, committed actions and values, would have an impact on decreasing potential academic procrastination and increasing minutes work engagement (Hayes et al., 2001). Using a concurrent multiple baseline design, three participants recorded schoolwork activity in minutes throughout the study. The two interventions consisted of one phase where participants identified and acted in accordance with their personal values. The second intervention participants identified, created and applied S.M.A.R.T. goals to their daily lives (Muñoz-Olano & Hurtado-Parrado, 2017). Two participants had recorded an increase in minutes worked daily (Covington, 2000). Implications of these results and future research is discussed. Keywords: academic procrastination, values, S.M.A.R.T. goals, committed actions, ACT

Submitted by admin tede (tede@pucgoias.edu.br) on 2018-07-05T12:17:59Z No. of bitstreams: 1 TAIS GUEDES DE MELO E ALVIM.pdf: 785191 bytes, checksum: 502ae5b90b8e7f3d1752be0cb2109994 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-07-05T12:17:59Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 TAIS GUEDES DE MELO E ALVIM.pdf: 785191 bytes, checksum: 502ae5b90b8e7f3d1752be0cb2109994 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-01-30 / Procrastination is the postponement of tasks, activities or decision-making and reaches a large portion of students and workers. Looking at this context, this dissertation had as main objective to investigate academic procrastination, as well as to analyze how the support of the environment and self-leadership can contribute to this understanding. Three studies were carried out - two theorists and one empirical one -, having as theoretical model the social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1991). In the first article, an analysis was made of the main theoretical references of academic procrastination, observing the antecedent and consequent variables. After analysis of the findings, it was observed that procrastination has been studied in several perspectives, but a scientific gap in the national and international productions that related the variables related to environmental support and procrastination, evidencing a wide field of investigation, was noticed. The second article verified, through a systematic review of the literature, how the self-leadership construct was studied by the scientific community in the period between 2006 and 2016. The results showed that although the studies focused on a common theme, construct is distinct in selected studies. In this way, it was emphasized the importance of developing more research focused on this theme, using specific instruments, validated in different countries. Finally, the third article aimed to broaden the understanding of the relationship between environmental support and academic procrastination with the influence of selfdirected strategies focused on behavior. According to the results, this influence can be direct and indirect, when it is shaped by self-leadership. The research findings suggest that the relationship between environmental support and academic procrastination is best explained through behavioral self-leadership strategies. It is evident that the use of mediation analysis was presented as a very important resource, since only then was it possible to verify with more clarity how self-directed strategies focused on behavior, as mediator variable, influence the direction or intensity of the relationship between environmental support and academic procrastination. / Procrastinação consiste no adiamento de tarefas, atividades ou tomadas de decisões e atinge uma grande parcela de estudantes e trabalhadores. Observando esse contexto, esta dissertação teve como objetivo principal investigar a procrastinação acadêmica, assim como analisar de que forma o suporte do ambiente e autoliderança podem contribuir para essa compreensão. Foram realizados três estudos – dois teóricos e um empírico –, tendo como modelo teórico a teoria social cognitiva (Bandura, 1991). No primeiro artigo, foi realizada uma análise dos principais referenciais teóricos da procrastinação acadêmica, observando as variáveis antecedentes e consequentes. Após análise dos achados, observou-se que procrastinação tem sido estudada em diversas perspectivas, entretanto percebeu-se uma lacuna científica nas produções nacionais e internacionais que relacionem as variáveis relativas ao suporte do ambiente e procrastinação, evidenciando um amplo campo de investigação. O segundo artigo verificou, por meio de uma revisão sistemática da literatura, como o construto autoliderança foi estudado pela comunidade científica no período entre 2006 a 2016. Os resultados demonstraram que, apesar dos estudos terem foco em um tema comum, a forma de avaliação do construto é distinta nos estudos selecionados. Desta forma, ressaltou-se a importância do desenvolvimento de mais pesquisas com foco nesta temática, utilizando instrumentos específicos, validados em diferentes países. E, por fim, o terceiro artigo, objetivou ampliar a compreensão da relação entre suporte do ambiente e procrastinação acadêmica com a influência das estratégias de autoliderança focadas no comportamento. De acordo com os resultados, essa influência pode ser direta e indireta, quando é moldada pela autoliderança. Os achados da pesquisa sugerem que a relação entre suporte do ambiente e procrastinação acadêmica é melhor explicada através das estratégias de autoliderança focadas no comportamento. Evidencia-se que a utilização da análise de mediação se apresentou como um recurso de suma importância, visto que somente assim foi possível verificar com mais clareza de que forma as estratégias de autoliderança focadas no comportamento, na condição de variável mediadora, influenciam na direção ou intensidade da relação entre suporte do ambiente e procrastinação acadêmica.

The adaptive-maladaptive debate in perfectionism research often centers on the issue of whether perfectionism affords the individual an advantage in academic performance. This study is an extension of a previous study by the authors that found maladaptive forms of perfectionism were positively associated with academic procrastination. Conversely, adaptive forms of perfectionism were negatively associated with academic procrastination. Additionally, although trait anxiety was positively associated with academic procrastination in general, this relationship was reversed for those scoring high in adaptive perfectionism but not maladaptive perfectionism. The purpose of the current study is to examine whether the relationships between perfectionism and procrastination is indirect with intrinsic and extrinsic motivation (respective to adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism) serving as mediators of this relationship. Additionally we will examine whether the relationship between anxiety and procrastination is moderated by intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.

The aim of the study was to investigate to what extent gender, age, academic achievement, depression and perfectionism predict academic procrastination among Faculty of Education students. The participants were 368 undergraduate students enrolled in five departments of Middle East Technical University, Faculty of Education. Data was collected by a questionnaire packet including demographic data form / Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students (PASS), Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS). The results of the multiple regression analysis for the total sample revealed that, self-oriented perfectionism, others-oriented perfectionism, academic achievement and depression were significant predictors of academic procrastination among Faculty of Education students. However age and socially prescribed perfectionism did not have any significant contribution to the prediction of academic procrastination. Predictive roles of the variables were differantiated across genders. While self-oriented perfectionism, others-oriented perfectionism, depression and academic achievement had significant predictive role on academic procrastination among females, self-oriented perfectionism was the only variable that had a significant contribution in predicting the academic procrastination of male students. Implications of the findings were discussed and some suggestions were made for further research.

The purpose of the present study was mainly fourfold / 1) to examine the undergraduate students&rsquo / level of academic procrastination in relation to gender / 2) to investigate the undergraduate students&rsquo / prevalence of procrastination in relation to gender in six areas of academic functioning namely / writing a term paper, studying for an exam, keeping up reading weekly assignments, performing academic administrative tasks, attendance tasks, and school activities in general / 3) to find out the relationship between academic procrastination score and academic achievement of undergraduate students / and 4) to reveal the self-reported reasons of academic procrastination in relation to gender. The Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students (PASS) was translated and adapted into Turkish and used as the data collection instrument. The data was gathered from 784 undergraduate students from different grades and 37 departments of Middle East Technical University. The results of the study revealed that 52% of METU students procrastinate on their academic tasks and the findings revealed that male students procrastinate more than female students. Moreover, the results of the prevalent analysis showed that the students nearly always or always engage in procrastination on the areas of studying for an exam, writing a term paper, and reading weekly reading assignments more than the other three areas namely / academic administrative tasks, attendance tasks and the tasks related to school activities in general. In addition, the results regarding the relationship between academic procrastination and academic achievement revealed a significant negative relationship between the two variables. Finally, factor analysis was conducted to find out the self-reported reasons of academic procrastination and four factors were found as excuses of students namely / fear of failure, risk taking, laziness, and rebellion against control.

Ο σκοπός της παρούσας διπλωματικής εργασίας είναι διπλός. Πρώτον, επιδιώκει την δημιουργία ενός προγράμματος ομαδικής συμβουλευτικής παρέμβασης με στόχο την αντιμετώπιση του φαινομένου της αναβλητικότητας των φοιτητών και την αναζήτηση πρακτικών λύσεων σχετικά με την ολοκλήρωση των ακαδημαϊκών τους καθηκόντων. Αποτελεί μια πρωτότυπη ερευνητική προσπάθεια, τουλάχιστον στην εγχώρια ερευνητική δραστηριότητα, καθώς έρχεται να καλύψει ένα κενό, αυτό της ομαδικής συμβουλευτικής παρέμβασης. Ο δεύτερος στόχος της εργασίας μας, αφορά την προσπάθεια αξιολόγησης του προγράμματος και της αποτελεσματικότητας του ως προς την αντιμετώπιση και την μείωση της αναβλητικότητας. Δεν σταθήκαμε, λοιπόν, μόνο στην κατάθεση ενός ολοκληρωμένου σχεδίου αντιμετώπισης της αναβλητικότητας, αλλά προχωρήσαμε στην υλοποίηση του θέτοντάς το εν συνεχεία σε πειραματικό έλεγχο με βάση συγκεκριμένες υποθέσεις. Ως εκ τούτου, γίνεται φανερό ότι η φύση του φαινομένου που επιζητούμε να μελετήσουμε καθιστά αναγκαία την υιοθέτηση μιας πειραματικής μεθοδολογίας και στρατηγικής. Το δείγμα της παρούσας έρευνας αποτέλεσαν φοιτητές του Πανεπιστημίου Πατρών. Ο αριθμός των συμμετεχόντων στο πρόγραμμα διερεύνησης/μείωσης της αναβλητικότητας συνολικά ανέρχεται σε 40 υποκείμενα. Είκοσι (20) άτομα, εκ των οποίων 8 άνδρες και 12 γυναίκες, αποτέλεσαν την ομάδα παρέμβασης, έχοντας μέσο όρο ηλικίας τα 23 έτη. Τα υπόλοιπα 20 άτομα (10 άνδρες και 10 γυναίκες) απάρτισαν την ομάδα ελέγχου της έρευνας, με μέσο όρο ηλικίας τα 25 έτη. Τα μέλη της ομάδας παρέμβασης συμμετείχαν σε έξι συνεδρίες του προγράμματος, καθεμία εκ των οποίων εστίαζε σε συγκεκριμένες θεματικές. Για την συλλογή των δεδομένων χρησιμοποιήθηκαν κατάλληλα ερωτηματολόγια και κλίμακες αξιολόγησης. Τα ευρήματα της έρευνας επιβεβαιώνουν την κύρια αρχική μας πρόβλεψη, ότι μετά την παρακολούθηση της ομαδικής συμβουλευτικής παρέμβασης, οι φοιτητές θα ανέφεραν μείωση της τάσης τους για αναβλητική συμπεριφορά στα ακαδημαϊκά καθήκοντα, στατιστικά σημαντική εν συγκρίσει με τους φοιτητές της ομάδας ελέγχου. Δεν επιβεβαιωθήκαμε ωστόσο ως προς το μέγεθος της διαφοροποίησης του χαρακτηριολογικού άγχους και της αυτοεκτίμησης μεταξύ των ομάδων παρέμβασης και ελέγχου. Λέξεις – κλειδιά: συμβουλευτική, αναβλητικότητα, ακαδημαϊκή αναβλητικότητα, ομαδική συμβουλευτική παρέμβαση, άγχος, αυτοεκτίμηση / -