The Psychological Origins of Procrastination and How to Stop Procrastinating
We all had experiences where we wanted to complete a project but put it off until later. Sometimes we wait because we just don’t care enough about the project, but sometimes we care a lot – and still do something else. For example, I clean my house when I need to evaluate a lot of works, although I know that I need to evaluate them.
This post was originally published in The Conversation .
So why are we putting things off until later? Are we made to act this way sometimes? Or is there something wrong with our approach to work?
These questions are central to my research into goal pursuit , which may provide some clues from neuroscience about why we procrastinate and how to overcome this trend.
To do or not to do
It all starts with a simple choice between working on this project now and doing something else: working on another project, doing something interesting, or doing nothing at all.
The decision to work on something is determined by how much we value the execution of the project at the moment – which psychologists call its subjective value. And procrastination, psychologically, is what happens when the value of doing something else outweighs the value of the job now.
This mindset offers an easy way to beat procrastination: find a way to increase the subjective value of the work now over the value of other things. You can increase the value of a project, reduce the value of a distraction, or use a combination of the two.
For example, instead of cleaning my house, I might try to focus on why rating is important to me personally. Or I might think about how unpleasant cleaning can be, especially when we live with a toddler.
This is simple advice, but sticking to this strategy can be quite difficult, mainly because there are so many forces that diminish the value of work in the present.
Remote deadline
People are not entirely rational in the way they value things. For example, a dollar bill is worth exactly the same today as it is a week later, but its subjective value – roughly how good it would be to own a dollar – depends on factors other than its face value, such as when we get It.
The tendency of people to devalue money and other goods over time is called delay discount . For example, one study found that, on average, getting $ 100 in three months costs people the same as getting $ 83 right now. People would rather lose $ 17 than wait a few months to get a bigger reward.
Other factors also influence subjective value, such as how much money someone recently made or lost . The key point is that there is no perfect match between objective value and subjective value.
Late discounting is a delay factor because the project will be completed in the future. Doing something is a deferred reward, so its value in the present decreases: the further the deadline, the less attractive it seems to work on the project right now.
Research has repeatedly shown that the procrastination tendency is in many ways consistent with economic models of discounting deferral. What’s more, people who call themselves procrastinators show exaggerated effects . They underestimate the value of getting things done ahead of time, even more than other people.
One way to increase the cost of completing a task is to make the finish seem closer. For example, a vivid view of future remuneration reduces discounting for delay .
No effortless work
Not only can the completion of a project be discounted by the fact that it will happen in the future, but working on a project can also be unattractive because of the simple fact that the work takes effort.
New research supports the idea that mental effort is inherently expensive ; for this reason, people usually prefer to work on an easier task than on a more difficult task. Moreover, the subjective costs of work that seem more complex are higher (although these costs can be offset by experience in completing the task at hand).
This leads to an interesting prediction that people will procrastinate the harder they expect from the job. This is because the more effort a task requires, the more someone can benefit from putting the same amount of effort into something else (a phenomenon economists call opportunity cost ). Because of the opportunity cost, working on something that seems difficult feels like a waste.
Of course, the research team shows that people postpone unpleasant tasks more. These results indicate that reducing the pain of working on a project, for example by breaking it up into more familiar and manageable parts, would be an effective way to reduce procrastination.
Your job, your personality
When we write that procrastination is a side effect of our values, task completion is seen as a result of motivation, not ability.
In other words, you may be really good at something, be it cooking a gourmet meal or writing a story, but if you don’t have the motivation or a sense of importance for completing a task, it will likely be delayed. …
It is for this reason that writer Robert Hanks, in a recent essay for the London Review of Books, described procrastination as “giving up appetite.”
The source of this appetite can be a little devious. But it could be argued that, like our (real) appetite for food, it is something that is closely related to our daily life, our culture, and our understanding of who we are.
So how do you increase the subjective value of a project? A powerful way – which my graduate students and I have written at length about – is to link the project to your self-esteem. Our hypothesis is that projects that are considered important to a person’s self-esteem will have more subjective value for him.
It is for this reason that Hanks also wrote that procrastination seems to stem from an inability to “sufficiently identify with your future self” – in other words, with the self for which the goal is most relevant.
Because people are motivated to maintain positive self-esteem , goals that are closely related to their sense of self or identity become much more valuable.
Linking the project to more immediate sources of value, such as life goals or core values, can fill the subjective value deficit that underlies procrastination.
The Psychological Origins of Procrastination – and How to Stop Procrastinating | Talk