In fact, procrastination \u2013 defined as voluntarily and unnecessarily delaying a task \u2013 is so widespread that scientists have even found evidence of the behaviour in pigeons<\/a>.<\/p>\n So, why do so many people procrastinate? What causes it? And, most importantly, how can you stop procrastinating?<\/p>\n Let\u2019s not put off answering these questions any longer. With the help of the University of Durham\u2019s Prof Fuschia Sirois<\/a>, a researcher who has dedicated 20 years to the topic, here\u2019s a beginner\u2019s guide to the psychology of procrastination.<\/p>\n It would be easy to say \u2013 as your mum probably does \u2013 that procrastination is the result of poor time management or, worse, sheer laziness. But the science simply doesn\u2019t back this up.<\/p>\n \u201cThere hasn\u2019t been any convincing scientific evidence to say procrastination is the result of poor time management. But we can easily say it\u2019s all to do with mood management,\u201d Sirois says.<\/p>\n \u201cAt its core, procrastination is about not being able to manage your moods and emotions. Although many think impulsivity and self-control are the problems \u2013 and they do play a factor \u2013 underneath is a poor emotional response.\u201d<\/p>\n Read more about psychology:<\/strong><\/p>\n As Sirois explains, every person faces stressful situations, demanding tasks that trigger brain activity that involves a brain region known amygdala. And it\u2019s the amygdala that processes emotions and signals threats, capable of prompting a \u2018fight or flight\u2019 response linked to procrastination.<\/p>\n \u201cInterestingly, people who say they are chronic procrastinators tend to have larger grey matter volume in the amygdala,\u201d says Sirois.<\/p>\n \u201cThis means they will also be more sensitive to the potential negative consequences of their actions, leading to more negative emotions and procrastination.\u201d<\/p>\n Another factor strongly linked to procrastination: temporal thinking. Or, to put it more plainly, how close you see the current version of yourself to yourself in the future.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re a normal person, chances are that you suck at temporal thinking. Really suck. In fact, studies conducted at The University of California, Los Angeles have indicated you probably imagine the future version of yourself as a completely different person altogether<\/a>.<\/p>\n Using functional MRI scans, researchers discovered that different sections of the brain are activated when we process information about our present and future selves. And that when we imagine our future self, the same regions of the brain are activated as when we think of a stranger.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is important as if you perceive your future self this way then it\u2019s easier to do something that might harm that person, leaving them a huge task rather than doing it yourself now,\u201d explains Sirois.<\/p>\n \u201cAs your future self might feel psychologically distant to you now, you might also see them as a kind of superhero. You might say \u2018Future me will have all the ideas because they\u2019ll be well-rested\u2019 or \u2018Future me won\u2019t have writers\u2019 block.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cHowever, the truth is that we really don\u2019t change much in a short period of time.\u201d<\/p>\n If you\u2019re a chronic procrastinator, you\u2019re probably well-versed in this fallacy. Fortunately, however, there is some evidence suggesting there\u2019s an easy way to improve your temporal thinking: do it more often.<\/p>\n For instance, one intriguing Applied Psychology<\/em> study of university students found that those who imagined a version of themself merely two months in the future (\u201cfrom a third and a first-person perspective\u201d) for 10 minutes twice a week were found to be less likely to procrastinate<\/a>.<\/p>\n As the researchers concluded, such a practice was \u201ceffective at increasing an altruistic motivation towards [a future self], mainly by procrastinating less in the present.\u201d<\/p>\n In short, procrastination can cause a lot more problems than missed deadlines. Over decades Sirois has examined the impact of chronic procrastinating on a person\u2019s health, her findings worrying at best \u2013 and downright terrifying at worst.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople who chronically procrastinate \u2013 people who make it a habit \u2013 have higher levels of stress and a greater number of acute health problems<\/a>. They are more likely to have headaches or insomnia or digestive issues. And they\u2019re more susceptible to the flu and colds.\u201d<\/p>\n Even more alarming, Sirois has found that procrastination is a factor that can lead to hypertension and cardiovascular disease<\/a>, with chronic procrastinators more likely to put off healthy behaviour such as exercise.<\/p>\n People who chronically procrastinate have been shown to not only perform worst as students, but also earn less money and have jobs with lesser perceived value to them<\/a>.<\/p>\n Studies have also shown procrastination leads to lower self-esteem<\/a>, fewer visits to the dentists and even a lack of \u2018Household safety behaviours\u2019 (for instance, checking to see if the fire alarm is working \u2013 extremely concerning considering there are an estimated 37,000 house fires a year in the UK<\/a>).<\/p>\n As you might have guessed by now, procrastination is a big<\/em> problem. But fortunately, psychologists know this and have been searching for effective methods to tackle it.<\/p>\n First, there are the many quick-fix procrastination aids. For example, one compelling Psychological Science<\/em> paper described how downsizing larger metrics of time (think 48 hours instead of 2 days, or 10,950 days instead of 30 years) can make events seem more immediate<\/a>, prompting people to engage in upcoming tasks.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n However, for Sirois, there are two primary ways of reducing procrastination at its root cause: self-compassion<\/strong> and cognitive<\/strong> re-framing<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cI think people don\u2019t realise that procrastinators, especially chronic procrastinators, are extremely<\/em> hard on themselves \u2013 before and after the task. And rather than getting on with the job, they just go round and round spinning their wheels,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n \u201cMy advice is to not go full in overidentifying and becoming that frustration. Step back from it for a minute and just acknowledge that you\u2019re not happy with yourself. And then move forward.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s basically about recognising that everybody screws up. You\u2019re not the first person to procrastinate, nor will you be the last. Welcome to the human race.\u201d<\/p>\n The data increasingly support this theory. For example, in a study of 750 people, Sirois found a firm link between procrastinating and lower levels of self-compassion<\/a> (those more likely to judge themselves harshly, believing they suffer from the problem alone).<\/p>\n Read more about psychology:<\/strong><\/p>\n But what does this all mean practically? First off, as Sirois contends, mindfulness exercises have been linked to greater self-compassion and lower procrastination levels.<\/p>\n As one study published in the International Journal of Applied Positive Psychology<\/em> found, those who completed a mere three-minute mindfulness exercise (involving \u201caudio instructions intended to induce non-judgmental awareness and attention to present body sensations, including breath\u201d) had less tendency to procrastinate afterwards<\/a>.<\/p>\n (You can find such breathing audio exercises through the NHS, such as this instructional video<\/a>.)<\/p>\n \u201cThese exercises help you take a little perspective, preventing you from running down a bad road of negative emotions that lead to procrastination,\u201d Sirois explains.<\/p>\n Sirois also points to a recent unpublished study conducted by PhD student Sisi Yang<\/a>. Experimenting with students that had a task they were procrastinating on \u2013 or they predicted they would procrastinate on \u2013 the participants were divided into several groups.<\/p>\n One group were encouraged to think about happy thoughts by engaging in certain activities (think watching videos of kittens). Another group were asked to reframe the upcoming task as something meaningful, pondering questions such as:<\/p>\n Interestingly, when monitoring the activity of all participants over the next few days, the second group procrastinated less.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s about reappraising. Seeing something as more meaningful. And when you create meaning, you create a connection to the task,\u201d says Sirois.<\/p>\n \u201cFinding meaning in the task, whether it\u2019s in relation to yourself or other people, is really, really powerful. And it\u2019s a great way to start that reappraisal process and dial down some of those negative emotions or at least make them more manageable.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Dr Sirois is a reader at the Department of Psychology in the University of Sheffield, primarily examining behaviour regulation. She is head of the Self-Regulation in Health & Well-Being Lab and her research has been published in numerous peer-reviewed journals such as Health Psychology<\/em>, Social Science and Medicine<\/em>, Journal of Psychosomatic Research<\/em>, Quality of Life Research <\/em>and the Journal of Behavioural Medicine.<\/em><\/p>\n Read more about psychology:<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p><\/div> <\/section> <\/body><\/html>\n Can’t break a pattern of procrastination? Prof Fuschia Sirois explains the scientifically-backed ways to get back on task. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":27450,"template":"","categories":[54],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"8"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/05\/how-to-finally-break-your-procrastination-habit-explained-by-a-psychologist.jpg",940,420,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/05\/how-to-finally-break-your-procrastination-habit-explained-by-a-psychologist-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/05\/how-to-finally-break-your-procrastination-habit-explained-by-a-psychologist-300x134.jpg",300,134,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/05\/how-to-finally-break-your-procrastination-habit-explained-by-a-psychologist-768x343.jpg",768,343,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/05\/how-to-finally-break-your-procrastination-habit-explained-by-a-psychologist.jpg",800,357,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/05\/how-to-finally-break-your-procrastination-habit-explained-by-a-psychologist.jpg",940,420,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/05\/how-to-finally-break-your-procrastination-habit-explained-by-a-psychologist.jpg",940,420,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Can't break a pattern of procrastination? Prof Fuschia Sirois explains the scientifically-backed ways to get back on task.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/27449"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}What causes procrastination?<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Is procrastination bad for your health?<\/strong><\/h2>\n
![\""procrastination\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/4\/2021\/05\/procrastination-office-12be4cc.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C396"\" "\\"\"procrastination\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>\nHow to stop procrastinating<\/strong><\/h2>\n
About our expert, Dr Fuschia Sirois<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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