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Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jcbs
From psychological distress to academic procrastination: Exploring the role
of psychological inflexibility
Nikolett Eisenbeck
a,∗
, David F. Carreno
b
, Rubén Uclés-Juárez
b
a
Karoli Gaspar University of the Reformed Church in Hungary, Budapest, Hungary
b
Department of Psychology, University of Almería, Almería, Spain
ABSTRACT
Academic procrastination is generally understood as a problematic emotion regulation practice related to poor mental health. Previous studies have linked it to
higher levels of psychological inflexibility, defined as the rigid dominance of certain psychological reactions over personal values in guiding actions. In order to
discover the exact role of psychological flexibility in procrastination, a sample of 429 university students completed measures of academic procrastination, psy-
chological inflexibility and general psychological distress, comprising depression, anxiety and stress. As predicted, higher levels of procrastination were related to
elevated psychological distress. Both procrastination and psychological distress were associated with psychological inflexibility. Moreover, psychological inflexibility
mediated the relationship between general psychological distress and procrastination. This mediator role was observed in the case of each negative emotional state
(depression, anxiety and stress) that make up general psychological distress. These results indicate that negative emotional states and academic procrastination may
be linked through the problematic self-regulation pattern of psychological inflexibility. The findings thus support the scope of interventions that target both psy-
chological distress and academic procrastination by decreasing psychological inflexibility and promoting values-based actions.
1. Introduction
Academic procrastination can be defined as the voluntary delay of
beginning or completing important and timely academic tasks
(Schouwenburg, 2004;Ziesat, Rosenthal, & White, 1978). It is esti-
mated that around 90–95% of the university population procrastinates
(Ellis & Knaus, 2002;Sommer & Haug, 2012), on average between 30%
and 60% of the time (Rabin, Fogel, & Nutter-Upham, 2011). According
to Steel (2007), p. 50% of students report that they always delay aca-
demic tasks and recognize this behavior as problematic. Not only are
these numbers alarming, but it has been observed that general pro-
crastination has significantly increased over the last few decades (Steel,
2007;Steel & Ferrari, 2013).
Putting off a task may not be troublesome in itself, but problematic
procrastination is typically accompanied with the knowledge that one
will be worse off doing so (Steel, Brothen, & Wambach, 2001) and it is
associated with some type of internal discomfort (Lay & Schouwenburg,
1993). Thus, procrastination has found to be heavily linked to poor
mental health (e.g., Stead, Shanahan, & Neufeld, 2010). In academic
settings, it has been associated with lower academic performance and
higher levels of stress, anxiety, irritation, regret, despair and self-blame
(Burka & Yuen, 1983;Pychyl, Lee, Thibodeau, & Blunt, 2000;
Rothblum, Solomon, & Murakami, 1986;Sirois, Melia-Gordon, &
Pychyl, 2003;Tice & Baumeister, 1997).
Despite the amount of research dealing with the relationships be-
tween procrastination and psychological problems, their causes and
maintaining factors are still not completely understood (e.g., Steel,
2007). A number of recent studies define it as short-term emotional
regulation practice that is characterized by avoidant cognitive tenden-
cies of aversive experiences (e.g., Baumeister & Heatherton, 1996;
Sirois & Pychyl, 2013). This notion is supported by empirical findings:
procrastination is related to frustration intolerance (Dryden & Dryden,
2014;Harrington, 2005) and students are more likely to procrastinate if
they perceive greater control over their mood (Tice, Bratslavsky, &
Baumeister, 2001). Furthermore, procrastinators appear to show a
disjunction between the present and the future self, being less focused
on the future, which is partially due to their actual negative mood
(Sirois, 2014a). They tend to turn their attention to experiences that are
more immediately and emotionally rewarding in order to regulate their
negative mood (Blunt & Pychyl, 2000;Sirois & Pychyl, 2013) and hence
become more absorbed in the present moment (Sirois, 2014b). Conse-
quently, procrastinators tend to experience an excessive discrepancy
between their work intentions and work actions (Steel et al., 2001).
As has been previously suggested (Glick, Millstein, & Orsillo, 2014;
Scent & Boes, 2014), the above findings may be consistent with a broad
theory of regulation of inner experiences, namely the theory of psy-
chological flexibility (e.g., Hayes, 2004;Hayes, Luoma, Bond, Masuda,
& Lillis, 2006;Hayes, Pistorello, & Levin, 2012). In short, psychological
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcbs.2019.07.007
Received 6 February 2019; Received in revised form 16 June 2019; Accepted 31 July 2019
∗
Corresponding author. H-1037, Bécsi street 324, Budapest.
E-mail address: eisenbeck.nikolett@kre.hu (N. Eisenbeck).
Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science 13 (2019) 103–108
2212-1447/ © 2019 Association for Contextual Behavioral Science. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
T
flexibility can be defined as “the ability to contact the present moment
more fully as a conscious human being, and to either change or persist
when doing so serves valued ends” (Hayes et al., 2006, p. 5). At the
other end of the spectrum, psychological inflexibility is “the rigid
dominance of psychological reactions, over chosen values and con-
tingencies, in guiding action” (Bond et al., 2011, p. 678). It involves
reactions to certain thoughts and emotions (e.g., feelings like high an-
xiety levels about an exam that can be accompanied with a desire to
reduce them by for instance staying in bed and watching TV shows).
Some reactions to these feelings can be problematic as they are in a way
incompatible with those actions that would bring the person closer to
what matters in life for them (e.g., spending the whole weekend lying in
bed and forgetting about one's responsibilities instead of studying for
the exam that would make the person closer to their dream of becoming
a lawyer). As such, psychological inflexibility is a problematic self-
regulation approach that involves processes related to the inability to
contact the present more fully, avoidance of unwanted inner experi-
ences, and lack of clarity and commitment to personal values.
There is growing literature supporting psychological inflexibility as
a possible trans-diagnostic process across several psychological dis-
orders (Bond et al., 2011;Kashdan & Rottenberg, 2010;Levin et al.,
2014). Indeed, psychological inflexibility has been found to be func-
tionally associated with depression, anxiety and general psychological
distress, among others (e.g., Bond et al., 2011;Masuda & Tully, 2011;
Venta, Sharp, & Hart, 2012). Previous research has also supported that
it mediates the relationships between self-concealment (the predis-
position of keeping distressing or potentially embarrassing personal
information from others) and emotional distress in stressful inter-
personal situations (Masuda, Anderson, Wendell, Chou, Price, &
Feinstein, 2011), between self-concealment and disordered eating
symptoms (Masuda, Boone, & Timko, 2011), and (together with emo-
tion dysregulation) between neuroticism and depression (Paulus,
Vanwoerden, Norton, & Sharp, 2016).
Some preliminary data have demonstrated the relationship between
procrastination and psychological inflexibility. A recent study (Glick
et al., 2014) reported that psychological inflexibility was positively
associated with both trait anxiety and academic procrastination, adding
to the prediction of academic procrastination over trait anxiety.
Gagnon, Dionne, and Pychyl (2016) found that general procrastination
was related to general psychological distress, acceptance, cognitive
fusion, attention to the present-moment and committed action. More-
over, one of the components of the psychological inflexibility model,
mindfulness, has been found to mediate the effects of procrastination on
stress and perceived health (Sirois & Tosti, 2012). Another closely re-
lated concept, self-compassion (an emotionally positive self-attitude
that entails self-kindness, common humanity and mindfulness; Neff,
2003), was shown to mediate between trait procrastination and stress
(Sirois, 2014c). Longitudinal studies have provided support to this ra-
tionale. Interventions targeting psychological inflexibility have brought
about successful reduction in levels of psychopathology and procrasti-
nation among university students (Dionne, 2016;Glick & Orsillo, 2015;
Scent & Boes, 2014;Wang et al., 2017). These interventions mainly
used techniques based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT;
Hayes, Strosahl, & Wilson, 1999), whose underlying mechanism of
change is to decrease psychological inflexibility (e.g., Ciarrochi, Bilich,
& Godsell, 2010). Generally, the aforementioned studies reported
moderate effect sizes.
Taken altogether, previous data suggest that psychological distress,
academic procrastination and psychological inflexibility are related
(e.g., Bond et al., 2011;Gagnon et al., 2016;Glick et al., 2014;Masuda
& Tully, 2011;Venta et al., 2012). We hypothesize that the relationship
between psychological distress and procrastination is mediated by
psychological inflexibility. That is, higher presence/intensity of un-
wanted private events (psychological distress) makes it more likely that
they would provoke avoidant tendencies and these inflexible reactions
towards unwanted feelings (not the feelings themselves) are the ones
that manifest themselves in problematic procrastination. That said,
there is no empirical evidence of this hypothesis so far. The present
study aims to investigate this gap in the literature by assessing the
possible mediator role of psychological inflexibility between general
psychological distress and academic procrastination and between each
of the negative emotional states (depression, anxiety and stress) that
constitute general psychological distress.
2. Method
2.1. Participants
The study was conducted at the University of Almería, Spain. A total
of 447 undergraduate students filled in the survey package that con-
tained multiple self-report measures. Five participants did not respond
to all the questionnaires, meaning their data was not taken into ac-
count. The final sample consisted of 442 students, with ages ranging
from 17 to 58 (M= 22.04, SD = 5.24) and comprised 76.2% females
(n = 337) and 23.8% males (n= 105). Most of the participants were
psychology majors (n= 331), while the rest of them were studying
education (n= 106), history (n= 2) and electrical engineering (n= 3).
3. Materials
Acceptance and Action Questionnaire-II. The Spanish version
(Ruiz, Langer Herrera, Luciano, Cangas, & Beltran, 2013) of the Ac-
ceptance and Action Questionnaire-II (AAQ-II; Bond et al., 2011) was
employed. The AAQ-II contains 7 items to measure psychological in-
flexibility, the inability to fully connect with the present moment and
persist in or change behavior in pursuit of personal goals and values.
Participants rate to what extent each statement is true for them, by
using a 7-point Likert scale from 1 (never true) to 7 (always true).
Accordingly, total scores range from 7 to 49, with higher scores in-
dicating greater psychological inflexibility. The AAQ-II is a unidimen-
sional measure with good psychometric properties: it was significantly
related to general psychopathology and quality of life measures and
showed good discriminant validity by differentiating between clinical
and nonclinical samples (Ruiz et al., 2013). It also showed a satisfactory
internal consistency of 0.88 (Ruiz et al., 2013). In the present study,
Cronbach's alpha was .91, 95% CI [0.90, 0.92].
Depression Anxiety Stress Scale. The Spanish version of the
Depression Anxiety Stress Scale (DASS-21; Bados, Solanas, & Andrés,
2005; original version by Brown, Chorpita, Korotitsch, & Barlow, 1997)
was implemented in the present study. Each item on this questionnaire
describes a negative emotional state experienced in the last week and
rated on a 4-point Likert scale ranging from 0 (did not apply to me at
all) to 3 (applied to me very much, or most of the time). The measure
consists of 21 items organized into three subscales assessing depression,
anxiety and stress, with each subscale consisting of seven items. Sub-
scales are created by adding the corresponding items together and
multiplying the results by two. The three subscales can be added to-
gether creating a score for general psychological distress. Maximum
scores are 42 for the subscales and 126 for the general psychological
distress. Higher scores indicate more frequent symptoms. The DASS-21
has shown adequate correlations with other questionnaires of anxiety,
depression and positive/negative affect and satisfactory discriminant
validity (Bados et al., 2005). It had good internal reliability with a
Cronbach's alpha of .84 for depression, 0.70 for anxiety and 0.82 for
stress (Bados et al., 2005). In the present study, alpha values for de-
pression, anxiety, stress and general psychological distress were 0.87,
95% CI [0.85, 0.88], 0.83, 95% CI [0.80, 0.85], 0.83, 95% CI [0.80,
0.85] and 0.93, 95% CI [0.91, 0.93], respectively.
Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students. The Spanish version
of the Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students (PASS; Natividad,
2014; original version by Solomon & Rothblum, 1984) was used. The
PASS is a 44-item self-report questionnaire that is divided into two
N. Eisenbeck, et al. Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science 13 (2019) 103–108
104
parts. Only the first part was implemented in this study, measuring
procrastination in six academic areas (writing a term paper, studying
for an exam, keeping up with weekly reading assignments, performing
administrative tasks, attending meetings and performing academic
tasks in general). Students are asked to indicate on a 5-point Likert scale
the frequency with which they procrastinate (1 = never procrastinate,
5 = always procrastinate) and the degree to which procrastination
creates a problem for them (1 = not at all a problem, 5 = always a
problem). A total procrastination score is generated by adding together
these two subscales (ranging from 12 to 60), with higher scores in-
dicating greater levels of problematic academic procrastination. The
third subscale regarding the intention of reducing procrastination was
not included, similarly to previous studies (e.g., Glick et al., 2014). The
PASS has shown to be related to student's grades (e.g., Natividad, 2014)
and to levels of depression, anxiety and low self-esteem (Solomon &
Rothblum, 1984). It also had good internal consistency of 0.86 (Garzon-
Umerenkova & Gil-Flores, 2017). Cronbach's alpha of the scale for the
present sample was .80, 95% CI [0.77, 0.83)].
3.1. Procedure
Participants were recruited through in-class announcements. At the
end of each class, students were asked to stay and participate in a short,
15-min study in which they would fill in paper-and-pencil ques-
tionnaires in the classroom. After providing their informed consent,
participants completed a set of questionnaires for demographic data
(age, gender and major), AAQ-II, DASS-21 and PASS. They received no
compensation for their collaboration and were fully debriefed at the
end of their participation. All procedures were approved by the host
institution.
3.2. Data analysis
First, we evaluated the required sample size for the mediational
analyses. According to Fritz and MacKinnon (2007), for the joint sig-
nificance test, a sample size of 405 or larger was required for 0.8 power.
This criterion was met, as our sample size was 442.
Statistical analyses were performed using SPSS, version 24 (IBM
Corp., New York). Missing data were 0.12% and were classified as being
‘missing completely at random’ (Little's Missing Completely at Random
Test: χ2 = 670.58, df = 689, p=.685). Missing data were replaced
with the Expectation-Maximization algorithm for each subscale. Cron-
bach's alphas were computed at 95% confidence intervals to evaluate
the internal consistency of the instruments. Descriptive statistics
(means, standard variations) and Pearson’ correlation coefficients were
calculated. Gender was dichotomously categorized (1 = male, 2 = fe-
male) for Pearson correlation analyses in order to estimate point
biserial correlation coefficient. Gender differences were also assessed
with independent sample t-tests and Cohen's d effect sizes were calcu-
lated.
Mediation was assessed by a series of multiple regression analyses
on unstandardized variables, using PROCESS, option 4 (Hayes, 2012).
We aimed to evaluate whether general psychological distress had a
significant indirect effect on procrastination through psychological in-
flexibility (Model 1); depression on procrastination through psycholo-
gical inflexibility (Model 2); anxiety on procrastination through psy-
chological inflexibility (Model 3); and stress on procrastination through
psychological inflexibility (Model 4). The mediation analyses were
performed using the bootstrapping method with bias-corrected con-
fidence estimates (MacKinnon, Lockwood, & Williams, 2004;Preacher
& Hayes, 2004). In the present analysis, the 95% confidence interval of
the indirect effects was obtained with 5000 bootstrap resamples (see:
Preacher & Hayes, 2008). Bootstrapping is a preferred method for
mediation analyses, because it overcomes certain limitations, such as
those associated with sampling distribution assumptions (Shrout &
Bolger, 2002).
4. Results
4.1. Academic procrastination: prevalence and correlations
Results showed that procrastination was high in our sample: 32.8%
of the students reported almost always or always procrastinating (an-
swering 4 or 5) on writing papers, 37.3% on studying for an exam,
37.1% on assigned readings, 16.8% on performing administrative tasks,
32.3% on attending meetings and 23.5% on performing academic tasks
in general. A total of 61.3% students found their procrastinatory be-
havior almost always or always a problem in at least one of the aca-
demic areas. Total procrastination scores (frequency and problem levels
added together) ranged from 12 to 60, with an average of 35.24
(SD = 7.65). These levels are consistent with results found in previous
studies among college students (e.g., Glick et al., 2014;Natividad,
2014;Onwuegbuzie, 2004;Solomon & Rothblum, 1984). Results on
AAQ-II and DASS-21 scales did not deviate from normative data in the
sample (see Bond et al., 2011;Henry & Crawford, 2005).
Means scores, standard deviations and inter-correlations for PASS,
AAQ-II, DASS-21, age and gender are shown in Table 1. Strong asso-
ciations were observed between the variables. In particular, higher le-
vels of psychological inflexibility were related to increased levels of
general psychological distress, depression, anxiety, stress and procras-
tination. Also, higher levels of procrastination were associated with
elevated levels of general psychological distress, depression, anxiety
and stress. No differences were found for age in the assessed variables.
Women, however, showed more stress, t(440) = −4.21, p< .001,
Table 1
Descriptive statistics and intercorrelations between variables.
PASS AAQ-II DASS-21 DASS-D DASS-A DASS-S Age
PASS (12–60)
AAQ-II (7–49) .335
∗∗
DASS-21 (0–126) .228
∗∗
.612
∗∗
DASS-D (0–42) .188
∗∗
.572
∗∗
.881
∗∗
DASS-A (0–42) .199
∗∗
.541
∗∗
.898
∗∗
.701
∗∗
DASS-S (0–42) .219
∗∗
.511
∗∗
.878
∗∗
.629
∗∗
.699
∗∗
Age .059 .001 .081 .185 .148 .064
Gender .022 .034 .126
∗∗
.064 .086 .184
∗∗
-.093
M35.11 22.74 37.98 11.24 10.41 16.32 22.04
SD 7.65 9.36 25.69 10.01 9.15 9.87 5.24
Cronbach's alpha [ 95% CI] .80 [ .77, .83] .91 [ .90, .92] .93 [ .91, .93] .87 [ .85, .88] .83 [ .80, .85] .83 [ .80, .85]
Note: N= 442; *p< .050; **p< .001. All pvalues are two-tailed.
PASS = Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students; AAQ-II = Acceptance and Action Questionnaire; DASS-21 = General psychological distress measured by the
Total Depression Anxiety Stress Scale; DASS-D =Depression subscale of the DASS-21; DASS-A =Anxiety subscale of the DASS-21; DASS-S = Stress subscale of the
DASS-21. Gender: 1 = male, 2 = female.
N. Eisenbeck, et al. Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science 13 (2019) 103–108
105
d= 0.44, 95% CI [0.22, 0.66] and general psychological distress, t
(440) = −2.67, p= .008, d= 0.30 95% CI [0.08, 0.52], than men (for
mean values, see Table 1). The findings that stress levels and the
combined scores of depression, anxiety and stress (general psycholo-
gical distress) are higher for women are consistent with the literature as
women tend to suffer more from internalizing disorders, such as de-
pression, anxiety and stress (e. g., Rosenfield & Mouzon, 2013).
4.2. Psychological inflexibility as a mediator between general psychological
distress and academic procrastination
To test whether the association between mental health problems
and academic procrastination could be explained by psychological in-
flexibility, several mediation analyses were carried out. Model 1 re-
presents the analysis assessing the mediator role of psychological in-
flexibility between general psychological distress and procrastination;
Model 2 between depression and procrastination; Model 3 between
anxiety and procrastination; and Model 4 between stress and procras-
tination.
In the case of Model 1 (see Table 2 and Fig. 1 for unstandardized
coefficients), general psychological distress was significantly related to
psychological inflexibility (a path) and psychological inflexibility was
also related to procrastination (b path). As the direct effect was not
significant and the 95% confidence interval for indirect effect did not
include zero, we can conclude indirect-only mediation of the psycho-
logical distress’ effect on problematic procrastination through psycho-
logical inflexibility. Further analyses showed that psychological in-
flexibility mediated the relationship between depression and
procrastination (Model 2), between anxiety and procrastination (Model
3) and between stress and procrastination (Model 4). However, each
model explains a relatively low percent of variance (11%) of academic
procrastination (see Table 2).
5. Discussion
The present study aimed to explore procrastination among under-
graduate students and evaluate the relationships between academic
procrastination, psychological distress and psychological inflexibility,
the latter being proposed as a mediator of the relationship between the
first two.
The participants showed high levels of academic procrastination,
the majority of them reaching problematic levels, indicating that aca-
demic procrastination is a widespread problem among undergraduate
students (e.g., Glick et al., 2014;Natividad, 2014;Onwuegbuzie, 2004;
Solomon & Rothblum, 1984;Steel, 2007). Academic procrastination
was found to be strongly correlated to general psychological distress
and its subscales, namely depression, anxiety and stress (for similar
results, see Beck, Koons, & Milgrim, 2000;Bui, 2007;Dryden, 2012;
Gagnon et al., 2016;Glick et al., 2014;Solomon & Rothblum, 1984). In
this sample, levels of stress and general psychological distress were
higher among females than males, consistent with earlier data
(Rosenfield & Mouzon, 2013). In line with previous studies, psycholo-
gical inflexibility was related both to general psychological distress and
its subdivisions, depression, anxiety and stress (Bond et al., 2011) as
well as to procrastination (Gagnon et al., 2016;Glick et al., 2014).
In addition, the study provided evidence for the first time in the
literature that psychological inflexibility mediated the relationship
between general psychological distress and academic procrastination.
This mediation effect was also found for each of the subscales that
comprise general psychological distress, namely depression, anxiety
and stress. These findings suggest that the relationship between these
negative emotional states and academic procrastination may be estab-
lished through psychological inflexibility, that is, psychological distress
is only related to procrastination if it the latter serves inflexible ten-
dencies of dealing with the distress.
These results are consistent with the literature on psychological
inflexibility. According to this approach, responding in an inflexible
manner implies not accepting one's own experiences as they are and
living a life that is not in line with what the person truly desires. In this
regard, what ultimately accounts for the lack of committed actions to-
wards one's values are not the negative feelings and thoughts per se, but
the way one responds to them (e.g., Hayes et al., 2006). Students en-
gaging in problematic procrastination might be delaying their academic
tasks not only because they experience negative emotional states, but
because they have a pattern of reacting to such experiences with
avoidance. Thus, the psychological inflexibility account also explains
why there are some students who do not engage in problematic pro-
crastinatory behaviors, despite feeling depressed, anxious or stressed.
These students may respond to their negative emotions with accep-
tance, sustaining their focus on what really matters in their lives despite
the presence of psychological distress.
Nonetheless, as this was a cross-sectional study, the causal direction
of the relationships cannot be confirmed. It could be argued that the
relationship between psychological problems and academic procrasti-
nation mediated by psychological inflexibility can be bidirectional. In
Table 2
Mediation analyses.
a path (X →
M)
b path (M →
Y)
Direct effect (c’
path) 95% CI
Indirect effect (ab
path) 95% CI
Model 1: X (DASS-21) → Y (PASS) mediated by M (AAQ-II)
R
2adj
= .11
F(2, 439) = 27.90**
b.22 .25 .01 [- .02, .04] .06 [.04, .08]
SE .01 .05 .02 .01
t16.23** 5.48** .66
Model 2: X (DASS-D)→ Y (PASS) mediated by M (AAQ-II)
R
2adj
= .11
F(2, 439) = 27.66**
b[CI] .54 .26 - .00 [- .09, .08] .15 [.10, .20]
SE .04 .05 .04 .03
t14.64** 6.15** - .10
Model 3: X (DASS-A) → Y (PASS) mediated by M (AAQ-II)
R
2adj
= .11
F(2, 439)= 27.78**
b[CI] .55 .26 .02 [- .07, .11] .15 [.10, .20]
SE .04 .04 .04 .03
t13.51** 6.00** .48
Model 4: X (DASS-S) → Y (PASS) mediated by M (AAQ-II)
R
2adj
= .11
F(2, 439) = 28.52**
b[CI] .48 .25 .05 [- .03, .13] .12 [.08, .17]
SE .04 .04 .04 .02
t12.47** 5.77** 1.24
Notes: N= 442; *p< .050; **p< .001. All pvalues are two-tailed. Coefficients
are unstandardized. PASS = Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students; AAQ-II
= Acceptance and Action Questionnaire; DASS-21 = General psychological
distress measured by the Total Depression Anxiety Stress Scale; DASS-
D = Depression subscale of the DASS-21; DASS-A = Anxiety subscale of the
DASS-21; DASS-S = Stress subscale of the DASS-21.
Fig. 1. Indirect effect of general psychological distress on procrastination
through psychological inflexibility. *p< .050; **p< .001.
N. Eisenbeck, et al. Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science 13 (2019) 103–108
106
other words, procrastinating, when it serves inflexible tendencies,
paradoxically can increase the level of unwanted thoughts and feelings
(for similar explanations see Sirois, 2004;Sirois & Pychyl, 2013;Sirois
& Tosti, 2012;Steel, 2007). It is quite possible that high levels of psy-
chological inflexibility can create a vicious circle dominated by un-
wanted experiences and their avoidance, preventing the person from
living a meaningful life.
Previous empirical findings have provided partial support of this
theory. Psychological flexibility and values-based actions have been
found to be predictors of procrastination (Gagnon et al., 2016;Glick
et al., 2014) and interventions aiming to increase psychological in-
flexibility in order to reduce procrastination were successful (Dionne,
2016;Mullen, 2014;Wang et al., 2017). Moreover, there is extensive
literature which perceives procrastination as a short-term mood re-
pairing self-regulatory strategy that is likely to have negative con-
sequences for the future (e.g., Baumeister & Heatherton, 1996;Sirois,
2004;Sirois & Pychyl, 2013;Steel, 2007). There is some support that
procrastination is linked to mental health problems, but only when
procrastinators react to their feelings and thoughts with maladaptive
control strategies. Among these strategies are, for instance, high levels
of absorption (Sirois, 2014b), negative self-judgments (Sirois, 2014c),
low levels of certain executive functions (Rabin et al., 2011), and low
levels of mindfulness (Sirois & Tosti, 2012). The psychological inflex-
ibility approach may form a theoretical framework that integrates the
set of previous psychological processes and may explain their connec-
tions to procrastination. Psychological inflexibility refers not only to the
general inability to coexist with unwanted experiences, but it also pays
special attention to the role of commitment to personal values, by
providing a theory of how the relationship that one establishes with
their own inner experiences can ultimately encourage or impede the
living of a meaningful life.
Despite the statistically significant and theoretically supported re-
sults, there are a number of limitations of the study that warrant
mention. Common method variance, which is attributable to the mea-
surement method, is a potential limitation of this paper similarly to
other studies in the field of behavioral research. External validity of the
findings may be limited, as the sample was mainly composed of female
psychology students. More research is needed regarding whether these
results are replicable in different student populations (e.g., males, other
university mayors or high school students) or in different contexts of
procrastination (implementing for example Lay's General
Procrastination Scale; Lay, 1986).
The use of self-report measures and the cross-sectional nature of the
study makes it difficult to establish causal links and directionality be-
tween the analyzed variables. Future studies may favor the use of
longitudinal design, experimental settings and behavioral measures in
order to determine causality. With the use of different self-report
questionnaires with regard to depression, anxiety and stress, different
results might have been obtained. Likewise, it may be relevant to in-
troduce more questionnaires to the analysis that measure concepts
potentially linked either to psychological inflexibility or academic
procrastination.
In spite of these limitations, findings of this study have several
implications. As psychological inflexibility is associated with academic
procrastination and general psychological distress, its measurement
may help to identify those students at risk of both. It may encourage the
design of interventions that target psychological inflexibility among
college students in order to reduce procrastination and at the same time
promote mental health. The few ACT and mindfulness-based interven-
tions in existence have shown promising results in diminishing pro-
crastination, but taking into account its prevalence and the possible
serious health and economic consequences, more studies are necessary.
In order to effectively tailor these interventions, it is crucial to under-
stand the characteristics of procrastination and its maintaining factors.
The authors consider that the present study is an important step in this
direction as it has provided novel empirical evidence of psychological
inflexibility as an underlying mechanism of procrastination.
Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in
the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Conflicts of interest
Nikolett Eisenbeck, David F. Carreno and Rubén Uclés-Juárez de-
clare that they have no conflict of interest.
Ethical approval
All procedures performed in studies involving human participants
were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/
or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration
and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Informed consent
Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants in-
cluded in the study.
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