Name: 我們為什麼會拖延？ (Why Do We Procrastinate?)
Uploaded: 2021-01-14T06:19:55.000Z
Duration: 8 min 36 s
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Sometimes the urge to put off something unpleasant -- like homework or calling to make a doctor’s

程度副詞

appointment -- is just too strong to resist.

情態副詞

Even though you know you’re going to have to do it eventually, and you can feel the

Let’s face it: procrastination affects all of us. At least a little bit.

But procrastination is more complex than just laziness or bad time management. In fact,

every subfield of psychology has a slightly different way of looking at it.

A neuropsychologist might call it a failure of executive function, or how you plan ahead

A social psychologist, on the other hand, might see it as a problem related to emotion

regulation, or trying to avoid bad feelings like stress.

And evolutionary psychologists think it could be partly genetic.

Even though all their approaches to studying it are a little different, researchers can

agree that procrastination is not so great for us.

So why do we do it, and how can we beat it?

Procrastination probably goes back as far as humans not wanting to do things.

A Greek poet even wrote about it in 700 BCE, basically warning not to put off your work,

And according to a 2014 study by researchers from the University of Colorado, Boulder,

it might even be part of our evolutionary makeup.

To try to figure out if there’s a genetic component to procrastination, researchers

asked pairs of twins about their work habits.

And the key thing is: they compared fraternal twins, who share only some of their DNA like

any set of siblings, with identical twins, who share all of their DNA.

Because each set of twins grew up together -- with basically the same environmental influences

-- comparing their responses could help see if their genetics corresponded at all to their

The researchers developed a mathematical model to calculate whether procrastination seemed

to be inherited. They found that about half the time, differences in procrastination habits

could be because of differences in genetics.

Which is the case with lots of inherited behavioral traits -- they have some variation due to

Not only that, but they reproduced a finding from other studies -- that genetic variations

in procrastination habits are related to genetic variations in another trait: impulsivity.

In other words, the researchers found that putting things off and acting impulsive are

behaviors that might be inherited together.

Both these traits are also probably related to goal-management, which they said could

be something to focus on in future research.

They also suggested an evolutionary reason why the procrastination and impulsive behaviors

Early human life was focused mainly on short-term survival. You don’t have time to think about

next month when you don’t know if your tummy’s going to be full tomorrow.

So our ancestors who prioritized short-term goals -- making rash decisions and putting

off the things with more distant and uncertain rewards -- could’ve been better at surviving.

And then they might’ve passed down some of their behavioral traits to their kids.

But these days, our world of skyscrapers and smartwatches places far more importance on

Save for retirement! Plan your vacation six months in advance!

So that genetic factor that prioritized the short-term over the long-term is suddenly

not so much in our favor, but it still makes us prone to procrastination.

But, hold up. You can’t just blame your procrastination on your genes.

There are lots of related psychological factors to procrastination and impulsivity, like how

On a neuropsychological level, procrastination can be described as a problem with executive

function, which is the skill set that allows us to plan, prioritize, and carry out tasks.

Executive function is basically the ability to say “I’m gonna do the thing!” And

Procrastination is the opposite: “I know I need to do the thing, but I’m not gonna

Which is why it’s often seen as an failure of executive function.

In 2010, researchers from the City University of New York found that undergraduate students’

own reports of their executive function could predict their tendency to procrastinate.

There are lots of different types of executive function skills, which provide multiple steps

For example, one student might sit down to get started on an assignment, but then spend

ages getting their study materials together.

Another person might plan to work, but have trouble getting focused enough to just sit

They get stuck at different points in the process, but they both end up putting off

Other social psychology researchers describe procrastination as a failure of mood regulation.

Canadian psychology professor Timothy Pychyl says that procrastination is “giving in

We’re cashing in a short-term good feeling even though we can be pretty sure it’s going

In other words, procrastination is an attempt to avoid bad feelings, like the stress or

We can rationalize this to ourselves pretty easily.

You may not want to start writing a big essay when you’re tired, so you tell yourself

you’ll do it later when you’ve had some rest. Nothing wrong with that.

Researchers like Pychyl argue that the trouble is when you do this all the time, with smaller

excuses -- habitually putting off tasks and pushing off those bad feelings.

But future-you will eventually have to confront that stress.

So procrastination isn’t just about time management and setting goals.

Mood regulation comes in when you accept those feelings of stress and recognize that they’re

It sounds like basic self-discipline, but it can be tricky to deal with the emotions

that come with large or difficult tasks. And we’ve all avoided negative feelings at some

Mood regulation and executive function both relate to what psychologists call self-regulation,

so these definitions are just slightly different approaches to studying procrastination.

Is procrastination really that bad, though?

Lots of people claim they procrastinate on purpose because they work better under pressure.

And certain kinds of procrastination do have some benefits.

Like if you go to the gym to avoid starting a paper -- sure, you didn’t get the paper

But you’ll be hard pressed to find psychology researchers who are in favor of procrastination.

Everyone puts things off every now and then, but people who do so chronically are sometimes

found to have higher levels of stress. And there may be a complex link to things like