Leisure and Procrastination, a Quest for Autonomy in Free Time Investments: Task Avoidance or Accomplishment?

Abstract

The purpose of the research was to analyze procrastination-a problem of time management that negatively affects the autonomy of people-in relation to leisure as a domain of everyday life. Specifically, the dynamics between leisure (activities and time invested-weekly frequency and duration of activity) and procrastination factors were studied. A sample of 185 university students (118 men and 67 women: M age = 20.77 years, SD age = 2.53) answered a procrastination scale-validated for the Spanish population-which refers to four factors of procrastination (dilatory behaviors, indecision, lack of punctuality, and lack of planning) and an adaptation of the Time Budget (TB) (a table where the participants were asked to specify "the three activities that you prefer to do when you are not studying or doing a paid job"). Results show that leisure activities are associated with factors of procrastination. As a matter of fact, the different factors of procrastination were related to specific types of leisure activities, depending on the weekly frequency of the activity or its duration. In this sense, there are cases in which the greater frequency of leisure activities (hobbies and computing, social life and entertainment) seems to contain-control, inhibit-procrastination (specifically, affecting its component of indecision) variations in the weekly frequency and duration of certain type of activities result in higher or lower scores on certain factors of procrastination. In sum, the time invested in leisure can protect from or inhibit delaying tasks-which implies enhancing the autonomy of people-a deduction that opens up new lines of research to identify optimal time investments for coping with procrastination.

Procrastination at the Core of Physical Activity (PA) and Perceived Quality of Life: A New Approach for Counteracting Lower Levels of PA Practice

“…Thus, those who practice PA more than 150 min per week or engage in sessions lasting at least one hour present lower levels of procrastination. These results coincide with findings showing that performing regular routines and activities that require a certain regular amount of time is a way to counteract procrastination [14,15,25]. Therefore, if spending more time on PA makes one procrastinate less in life in general, then greater dedication to PA is associated with more and better time management.…”

“…The procrastination behaviour, in addition to being a problem that has a negative impact on completing tasks, also negatively affects the perception of the quality of life because it produces stress, anxiety, insomnia, and depression [18,19]. Although the phenomenon of procrastination has mainly been studied in academic settings [20][21][22][23], it has an influence on various aspects of everyday life [24,25], it tends to be somewhat more pronounced among men than among women but represents a problem throughout life, even though it gradually decreases with age [26,27]. Thus, it is estimated that half of all students and a fifth of adults see themselves as severe and chronic procrastinators [18].…”

Academic Procrastination and Self-control of Faculty Nursing Students

“…All data were collected, tabulated and statistically analyzed using SPSS 23 shows Relation between personal characteristics of studied nursing students and their academic procrastination level; it's clear from the table that the high academic procrastination level was cascade from grade(4), grade(3), grade(2), least percent in grade(1)the difference statistically significant p=(0.012). while it was significantly lower in males, compared to females p=(0.042).Also, there was statistically significant difference in academic procrastination level according to the reason for the students joining the college, in favor of the desire of the students to engaged to nursing faculty p=(0.002).…”

“…Tool 1: Part 1: Demographic data sheet. This part developed by Özer & Ferrari (23,24) and used to collect personal data of nursing students that were: age, academic year, gender, Pre -education before enrollment to the faculty, and Reason for joining to this faculty. Part two: Procrastination Assessment Scale for Students It was measure frequency and other part measure reasons for procrastination among nursing students.…”

Effects of academic self-regulation on procrastination, academic stress and anxiety, resilience and academic performance in a sample of Spanish secondary school students

“…This, of course, affects with a diminished sense of well-being. It results in stress, difficulties in following instructions (Milgram et al, 1992), unpunctuality (Pestana et al, 2020), poor school performance (Kim and Seo, 2015), personality problems (Park and Sperling, 2012). However, studies on procrastination in education are mostly descriptive and unidirectional.…”