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Differential incidence of procrastination between blue and white-collar workers
Abstract
The present study compared chronic procrastination tendencies claimed by “whitecollar” working adults (n = 141) with rates reported by Harriott and Ferrari ( 1996) of “blue-collar” working adults (n - 211). Participants completed reliable and valid measures of everyday procrastination tendencies (decisional, arousal, and
avoidant), and socio-demographic items at one of several public forums. Results showed no significant difference between classes
of working adults on age, gender, marital status, or the number of children, although “white-collar” workers claimed higher
levels of education than “blue-collar” workers. “White-collar” workers also reported significantly higher scores on all three
forms of chronic procrastination than “blue-collar” workers. It seems that professional employees report procrastination more
frequently than unskilled workers. Further research is needed to explore the causes and consequences associated with differences
in chronic procrastination by occupational group.
... of the master degree students obtained their degrees by the stipulated year (Álvarez, et al., 2012). Hammer and Ferrari (2002) found that higher decisional procrastination happened in college graduates compared to high school graduates. One of the reasons is that college graduates have more work responsibilities and high-level family or economic pressures, that increased the decisional procrastination, for example the decision to postpone the master dissertation. ...
... Family obligations dependency. Hammer and Ferrari (2002) found that higher decisional procrastination happened in college graduates compared to high school graduates. One of the reasons is that college graduates have more work responsibilities and high-level family or economic pressures, that increased the decisional procrastination, for example the decision to postpone the master dissertation. ...
... Besides job pressures, students felt that family obligations were an obstacle for finishing their thesis: "All my free time dedicated to my family". Hammer and Ferrari (2002) found that higher decisional procrastination happened in college graduates compared to high school graduates. One of the reasons is that college graduates have more work responsibilities and high-level family or economic pressures, that increased the decisional procrastination, for example the decision to postpone the master dissertation. ...
The purpose of this study is to understand the role of Outsight Theory of Behavior Change (OTBC) and Grit concept, on the phenomena of master degree thesis procrastination, experienced by postgraduate student, in two private universities of La Paz Bolivia. A qualitative phenomenological descriptive proceed was used to achieve this purpose. Fifteen master program students with a pendant thesis for more than a year, described their experiences, believes, emotions and ideas regarding the thesis procrastination. The primary source of data in this study were transcriptions of interviews. Results show that the main obstacles experienced by the student -in the attempt to finish the thesis- were low self-regulation under external obligations, self-confirmation believes of overconfidence and under confidence, and poor time management and poor energy management for been overwhelmed by work.
... Procrastination in online courses poses significant barriers to completion, with completion rates as much as 40 to 50% lower in online courses compared to face-to-face higher education courses . Among workers, higher procrastination is associated with lower income, shorter employment duration, and a higher likelihood of underemployment , with white-collar workers reporting higher levels of chronic procrastination than blue-collar workers Hammer & Ferrari, 2002). Several studies have also observed group-level procrastination, with the rate of productivity among business teams found to increase as available work time decreases (Waller et al., 2002). ...
... Student procrastinators, for example, have been found to experience greater anxiety and receive significantly lower grades on both written assignments and exams compared to non-procrastinators . Among workers, procrastination is associated with lower income, shorter employment duration, and a higher likelihood of underemployment , with white-collar workers reporting higher levels of chronic procrastination than blue-collar workers Hammer & Ferrari, 2002). Several studies have also observed group-level procrastination, with the initially slow rate of productivity among business teams increasing as the remaining available work time decreases (Waller et al., 2002). ...
Procrastination is the volitional delay of an intended task, despite believing that delay will be harmful. While not all delay is attributable to procrastination, procrastination is fundamentally characterised by delay. As much as 90% of the population have experience with procrastination, with around 20% in the general population and 50% of university students reporting problematic levels of chronic procrastination. Compared to their non-procrastinating peers, chronic procrastinators report lower levels of wellbeing, higher rates of depression, higher rates of alcohol and other drug use for coping, and poor health adjustment. Procrastinators tend to have lower salaries, shorter durations of employment, and a greater likelihood of being unemployed or underemployed. There is also a direct economic impact on the workforce, with office workers found to spend an average of 1.5 hours per work day procrastinating.
Despite its prevalence, the variability of tasks, time available, subjectivity, and individual differences render procrastination difficult to observe as it happens. Consequently, while correlates, antecedents, effects, and types of procrastination have been widely investigated, progress in this field is limited by several factors. In particular, few studies have accurately quantified delay associated with procrastination over time. As a consequence, there is limited evidence supporting the ability of trait measures of procrastination to predict delay, and few interventions aimed at reducing procrastination have been clearly associated with reduced delay. Recent developments in smartphone technology and Experience Sampling Method (ESM) applications have enabled intensive longitudinal observations of such dynamic phenomena with relative ease; however, such methodology and statistical modelling of delay have yet to be reliably applied to the study of procrastination.
To address the challenge of observing delay associated with procrastination, I conducted three studies of students enrolled in a 1st year psychology course: a small pilot study (N = 24) and two larger scale replications (Ns = 80 and 107) focusing on intensive longitudinal measurement of delay, procrastination scale validation, and an intervention to reduce procrastination respectively. Participant ages ranged from 17.38 to 65.85 years (M = 23.85, SD = 9.49) and 75% identified as female. Each study included a baseline survey of demographic and trait procrastination and personality variables, an ESM phase comprised of 28 SMS surveys over 14 days in the lead-up to submission of an assignment worth 30% of the course grade, and the collection of assignment submission date and mark from the course convenor. Participants in the ESM phase were randomly allocated into either an intervention or control condition, with participants in both conditions reporting their assignment progress, completion intent, and affect regarding their assignment progress. Participants in the intervention, but not the control, condition were messaged at the end of each ESM survey with open reflection prompts designed to reduce procrastination. Studies 1 and 3 also included follow up interviews with a small subsample of participants (N = 8) to garner first-hand perspectives of participation in the ESM component of the studies.
Through the application of multilevel model analyses, the presence of quantified delay curves in all three studies provides firm evidence that regular self-reporting of task progress using ESM is a robust and reliable method for measuring behavioural delay. The use of multilevel modelling in quantifying delay enabled the inclusion of mixed effects, where the predictive ability of several procrastination scales could be assessed. A trait measure of passive procrastination was found to reliably predict behavioural delay, whereas no association was found between a measure of active procrastination, a type of procrastination purported to be adaptive and deliberate, and delay. The intervention prompting regular reflection on factors thought to be related to procrastination that was embedded into the ESM phase of each study was found to significantly reduce delay in Studies 1 and 3, but not in Study 2. Between-study differences in this intervention effect were likely related to contextual differences as participants in Study 2 were aware that the research pertained to procrastination whereas those in the other studies were not informed of the focus on procrastination. In the follow-up interviews, participants reported that regularly reporting task progress, as well as the intervention reflection prompts, may have assisted with the reduction of procrastination. Analyses conducted into the relationships between trait procrastination, neuroticism, and state affect and delay revealed that neuroticism (emotional stability) moderated the relationship between trait procrastination and affect, and affect mediated the relationship between trait procrastination and task delay. Moreover, cross-lagged panel model analyses of inter-temporal changes in affect and delay showed that participants who reported greater task progress at an earlier time were likely to report higher positive affect at a subsequent time, whereas those reporting higher positive affect at an earlier time tended to report lower progress at a subsequent time.
Overall, the research offers three specific unique contributions to the body of knowledge. First, the use of ESM surveys of task progress is demonstrated to be a reliable method for measuring behavioural delay associated with procrastination. This is evidenced by the presence of accelerating delay curves, where assignment progress increases in a hyperbolic trajectory prior to a submission date. The reliable observation and modelling of delay is an oft-cited limitation of the field; thus, the replicated validation of this as a reliable method constitutes a valuable contribution. Second, multilevel mixed effects modelling is used to assess the ability of scales measuring different aspects of trait procrastination to predict behavioural delay, indicating that some trait procrastination measures are more predictive of behaviour than are others. The statistical method employed, and the use of task progress rather than study duration as the outcome, enabled the construct validity of the contentious ‘active’ form of procrastination to be challenged. This approach is proposed also to be a suitable method for assessing the behavioural efficacy of targeted interventions for reducing procrastination. Third, sending regular reflection prompts to randomly selected ESM recipients resulted in a significant reduction in behavioural delay in two of the three studies. This use of low-intensity reflection prompts delivered at a high frequency demonstrates smartphone use can be an effective medium for reducing procrastination without the need for intensive approaches requiring considerable commitment from both practitioners and participants. This intervention design sets an example for reducing delay in academia, with the method likely capable of being extended, with adaptation, to procrastination in other areas such as health behaviour change, personal finance, and collective action.
... Although procrastination manifests itself in different domains: academic [25][26][27], work [28][29][30], financial [31,32], retirement-related [33,34], medical [35,36]; or in habits such as going to bed [37,38], among others; procrastination in academic settings is the most studied. ...
Academic procrastination is a complex behavior that hampers the cyclical process of selfregulation
in learning, impeding the flow of actions necessary to achieve the goals and sub-goals
that students have set out to attain. It has a high frequency of occurrence and has been linked to
lessened student performance and a decrease in psychological and physical well-being. The objective
of this study is to analyze the psychometric characteristics of a new academic procrastination scale
MAPS-15 (Multidimensional Academic Procrastination Scale) applicable in self-regulated learning
environments through a cross-validation study (exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor
analysis). The sample consisted of 1289 students from a distance/online university, with a wide
age range and sociocultural variability. The students completed self-reported online questionnaires
on two dates: during the university access and adaptation phase and before the first period of
compulsory exams. One-, two- and three-factor structures were tested as well as a second-order
structure. The results support a three-dimensional structure of MAPS-15: core procrastination, a
pure dimension of procrastinating behavior and difficulty in carrying out the action; poor time
management, a dimension related to time organization and perceived control over time; and work
disconnection, a dimension conceptually related to lack of persistence, and work interruptions.
... Procrastination is a behavior that manifests itself in all areas of human life. Hammer and Ferrari (2002) emphasized that this behavior is between 70 and 95% in the academic field. When the procrastination literature is examined, it is seen that this behavior is not only caused by bad time management, but has cognitive, affective and behavioral dimensions. ...
Araştırmanın amacı müzik öğretmeni adaylarının çalgı performans öz-yeterlik, çalgı çalışma sürecinde öz-düzenleme ve çalgı çalışma sürecine erteleme düzeyleri arasındaki ilişki incelenmiştir. Araştırmaya 454 aday katılmıştır. Araştırmadan elde edilen sonuçlara göre adayların çalgı performans öz-yeterlik ve çalgı çalışma sürecinde öz-düzenlemeli öğrenme düzeyleri yüksek, çalgı çalışma sürecinde erteleme düzeyleri ise düşük olarak bulunmuştur. Araştırmada adayların çalgı çalışma sürecindeki erteleme düzeylerinin çalgı çalışma sürecinde öz-düzenlemeli öğrenme ve çalgı performans öz-yeterlik değişkenleri tarafından ne derecede açıklandığının belirlenmesi için hiyerarşik regresyon analizi yapılmış, çalgı çalışma sürecinde öz-düzenlemeli öğrenmenin ertelemenin çalgı performans öz-yeterliğe göre negatif yönde daha güçlü bir açıklayıcısı olduğu görülmüştür. Analizde adayların çalgılarını kendi isteklerine göre seçip seçmediğine göre regresyon analizi tekrarlandığında ise çalgı performans öz-yeterliğin çalgısını isteyerek seçmeyen grupta etkisini tamamen yitirdiği saptanmıştır. Analizde adayların çalgılarını isteyerek seçip seçmemelerinin tüm değişkenlerde istatistiksel olarak anlamlı fark oluşturduğu gözlemlenmiş, farkın her değişkende de çalgısı isteyerek seçen grubun lehine olduğu tespit edilmiştir. Cinsiyet açısından araştırma değişkenleri incelendiğinde ise sadece çalgı çalışma sürecinde öz-düzenlemede kadınlar lehine anlamlı farka rastlanmıştır. Adayların mezun oldukları lise türüne göre araştırma değişkenlerinde anlamlı farka rastlanmamıştır. Araştırma değişkenleri arasında yapılan korelasyon analizi sonucunda ise çalgı performans öz-yeterlik ile çalgı çalışma sürecinde öz-düzenlemeli öğrenme arasında yüksek düzeyde pozitif ilişki, çalgı çalışma sürecinde erteleme ile çalgı performans öz-yeterlik ve çalgı çalışma sürecinde öz-düzenlemeli öğrenme arasında negatif yönde orta düzey ilişki olduğu tespit edilmiştir.
... 5,6 Yapılan bir araştırmaya göre erteleme davranışı, erişkinlerin %20,0'sinde görülmektedir. 7 Ertelemenin bir alt türü olarak tanımlanan akademik erteleme ise, özellikle öğrenciler arasında yaygındır. Türk öğrenciler ile yapılan bir çalışmada "akademik erteleme" öğrencilerin %52,0'sinde görülmüştür. ...
... Research has shown that blue-collar workers and white-collar workers differ in some occupational constructs related to learning (cf. Cerasoli et al., 2018;Kyndt & Baert, 2013), including stress and recovery factors, everyday procrastination, job satisfaction events, and meaningful work perception (Hammer & Ferrari, 2002;Lips-Wiersma et al., 2016;Locke, 1973;Schreurs et al., 2011), and do not differ in others, for example, burnout (Toppinen-Tanner et al., 2002). These differences partly reflect the personal characteristics of the employees and different work demands of manual and thinking work. ...
The challenges resulting from increasing digitalization and globalization require flexible continuing education for white-collar workers. Especially informal learning becomes increasingly important in the modern workplace. Practitioners want to promote informal learning among employees, researchers want to unveil conducive contex-tual conditions for informal learning, but they lack an appropriate , validated measure. Based on the octagon model of informal workplace learning (Decius et al., Human Resource Development Quarterly, 2019, 30, 495-535) and an existing 24-item scale for blue-collar workers, we present a short version of eight items for use among white-collar workers. Using three independent samples of 695, 500, and 3134 German employees, we show that the second-order factor structure-following the multidimensional octagon model-has a better fit compared with a model in which all items load on a single factor. The short scale is strongly correlated with the original full scale. The scale's reliability is satisfying (α = 0.76/0.77/0.85; ω = 0.78/0.78/0.86), considering the heterogeneous conceptual nature of informal learning. Regarding criterion validity, we found theoretically expected correlations with job demands, job autonomy, knowledge/skill acquisition, age, and self-directed learning orientation. Furthermore, the scale reveals measurement invariance across socio-demographic characteristics of gender and educational background. We also discuss implications for research and practice of the new informal learning measure among white-collar workers.
... Academic tasks are mostly individual efforts, while tasks at the workplace are usually related to workers' whole team. Accordingly, procrastination at the workplace affects the overall efficiency and achievement of an organization and is far more costly than academic procrastination (Hammer & Ferrari, 2002;Lonergan & Maher, 2000). Everyday tasks and responsibilities may also become a target of procrastinating behavior (Lay & Brokenshire,1997;Milgram et al., 1988;Sigall et al., 2000) and are related to everyday decision making. ...
In this study were examined procrastination and working styles among 142 male and female high school students in Serbia. Specifically, the aim was to investigate the relationship between the tendency to procrastinate and working styles when gender was introduced as a moderator variable. Irrational Procrastination Questionnaire was used to assess procrastination, whereas working styles were measured by the Working styles Questionnaire. Conducted two-factorial MANOVA revealed that the relationship between procrastination behavior and a composite of work hard, hurry up, be strong, be perfect, and please others working styles was moderated by gender (i.e. procrastination x gender interaction was statistically significant). In addition, univariate analysis (two-way ANOVA) revealed that only the relationship between procrastination and working style hurry up was moderated by gender. Simple effects analysis indicated that this working style was almost equally expressed between male students with a low and high propensity to procrastinate their obligations, while female students with a highly expressed tendency to procrastination showed evidently stronger preference to work under the time pressure and to delay work until it becomes urgent in comparison to female students who tend to procrastinate less.
... Our empirical demonstration of the validity of this explanation for procrastination is naturally limited by our use of a specific experimental context and the elicitation of stated rather than revealed preferences. However, we note that it is also consistent with interesting sociological observations, viz. the fact that procrastination is endemic among workers meant to operate at the boundaries of their knowledge such as students and researchers (Schouwenburg, 1995), greater procrastination among white-collar workers than blue-collar workers (Hammer & Ferrari, 2002), and the observation that the societal prevalence of procrastination appears to be increasing with the complexity of worker roles (Milgram, 1992). Testing this proposal in more naturalistic settings, and using revealed rather than stated preferences, constitutes a strong direction for future work. ...
Current theories of procrastination argue that people put things off into the future with the expectation that they will be better able to do them later. In this paper, we rationalize such expectations within the framework of evidence accumulation models of the choice process. Specifically, we show that it is rational for observers to adopt lower decision thresholds for choices with weak evidence for any alternative, and that observers learning to estimate optimal decision thresholds for tasks that involve decisions will find it reasonable to put the tasks off until the threshold has been sufficiently lowered by time-varying urgency. We designed a computational model and an experiment to differentiate our theory from more general expectancy based temporal motivation accounts. Both simulation and experimental results support our proposal, indicating a large role for choice difficulty in people's self-assessed estimates for how likely they are to procrastinate any given task.
El principal objetivo de la presente investigación es analizar, basándose en la teoría AMO, las diferencias en las percepciones de las personas trabajadoras de mano de obra directa e indirecta con respecto a las prácticas de gestión de personas implantadas en una cooperativa de MONDRAGON. La literatura académica ha prestado poca atención a cómo perciben las personas trabajadoras las prácticas de gestión de personas en las cooperativas teniendo en cuenta la variable del tipo de mano de obra (directa e indirecta). El análisis se ha realizado mediante un estudio de caso, combinando el enfoque cuantitativo y cualitativo. Los resultados de la investigación muestran que, en el seno de una misma cooperativa y en lo que a las prácticas de gestión de personas se refiere, existen diferencias significativas en las percepciones de las personas trabajadoras de mano de obra directa e indirecta. Ello se debe a las diferentes características, trabajos y/o tareas que desarrollan ambos colectivos, lo que se traduce en comportamientos y percepciones diferentes. El presente estudio pretende servir a las organizaciones, y sobre todo a los departamentos de gestión de personas de las mismas, como input de reflexión sobre cómo se aproximan a las personas trabajadoras y cómo tienen diseñados sus procesos de gestión de personas, animándolas a personalizar las mismas según el tipo de mano de obra.
Explored the prevalence of avoidant, arousal, and decisional types of procrastination among 64 members of a public gathering, 54 professionals, 59 bank employees, and 34 university managers. At 4 public meetings, Ss (mean age 47.6 yrs) completed measures of demography and decisional, avoidant, and arousal procrastination. Results show that about 20% of the adult community population claimed to be chronic procrastinators, with the highest rates of all 3 procrastination types reported by members of the general public compared to other groups. Ss who were separated, divorced, or widowed reported higher rates of procrastination (independent of number of children) than Ss who were currently married or never married. Ss with high school education or less reported higher rates of decisional procrastination than Ss with college or postcollege educations. Occupational groups differed on decisional procrastination. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Academic procrastination was examined within a nontraditional population of commuting students (N = 386, M age = 25.64), who were ethnically, economically, and culturally diverse. Students completed a self-report measure, the PASS (Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students; Solomon & Rothblum, 1984). In comparison to previous results with traditional students, academic procrastination among nontraditional students was higher in reading weekly assignments and school activities in general, but lower in writing a term paper and attendance tasks. In comparison to previous results with African-American students, the present study found lower academic procrastination on attendance tasks and administrative tasks. Older students, women, and students born outside of the United States reported lower academic procrastination tendencies. No differences in reported academic procrastination were observed based on: ethnicity, whether students were the first members of their families to attend college, or whether students possessed a high school diploma. Finally, academic procrastination scores were negatively correlated with cumulative grade point average (GPA).
This study compared perceived job security of 61 college professors with those of 3,442 other white-collar workers and 2,583 blue-collar workers using the 1972-1994 General Social Surveys as the database. Analysis indicated the college professors express greater security in their jobs, being less likely to think they would lose their jobs in the next year, and being more confident about finding a comparable job, if forced to do so.
The field study reported here explored the relationship between the job insecurity associated with a layoff and the work effort of employees who survived it. The relationship took the form of an inverted U, particularly among survivors whose economic need to work was relatively high. Theoretical implications are discussed, as are the limitations of the study and suggestions for future research. Recent theory and research on layoffs have sought to identity the factors that influence the work behaviors and attitudes of those not laid off, the layoff survivors (Brockner, Grover, Reed, DeWitt, & O'Malley, 1987). Previous research investigating this question has focused on the effects of perceived fairness as key determinants of survivors' reactions. In an attempt to provide a more complete explanation of the determinants of survivors' reactions, the present study used a somewhat different theoretical underpinning, one emphasizing survivors' perceptions of their job insecurity. Greenhalgh and Rosenblatt (1984) suggested that the level of job insecurity survivors experience depends on: (1) perceived threat, which is affected by such issues as the estimated likelihood of job loss, and (2) perceived control, which is influenced by survivors' belief that they or their employer can take some action to help them counteract the negative consequences of job loss. According to this two-component model of job insecurity, survivors' level of job insecurity should be: (1) highest when perceived threat is high and perceived control is low, (2) lowest when perceived threat is low and perceived control is high, and (3) moderate when both threat and control are high or both threat and control are low. The central dependent variable in the present study-change in the work effort survivors make, relative to the prelayoff period-was chosen for several reasons. First, survivors' level of effort is one of the key determinants of their job performance; the other is ability. It seems unlikely that ability
The personality disorder of dispositional procrastination was significantly related to a concern for appropriate self-presentations. Procrastinators (n = 39) and nonprocrastinators (n = 36) rated a social ability task more attractive, personally relevant and likely to be performed well than a cognitive ability task. Procrastinators and nonprocrastinators stated they would prefer to complete the social task, yet in a public performance feedback condition procrastinators only chose to complete the cognitive task. Results were interpreted in terms of self-presentation strategies by dispositional procrastinators, and draws attention to a pathological personality that has largely been ignored by research psychologists.