What Type Of Procrastinator Are You?

By Samantha DeJesus on October 5, 2012

I enter my dorm room after a long day of class and know I have an article due before midnight; I would like to watch the presidential debate tonight so my goal is to get the article written in time. I take my laptop out of my backpack and plug it into it’s charger. I turn it on, enter my password, and resume my prior session. Without thinking, I log right on to Facebook. I’m scrolling through my homepage seeing what all my friends have been up to today when I notice a friend posted one of Taylor Swifts new songs from her upcoming CD Red. I click play, listen to it, love it, download it, and listen to it again. That’s when my phone goes off. It’s my turn to make a move in my heated game of Words With Friends. I throw my feet up on my desk and lean back in my chair while I contemplate my move. After five minutes I play the word “Quiz,” the “Q” being on a triple letter tile (big time points). By now my laptop’s screen saver is up. I wiggle the mouse to see what time it is. It’s 4:15 and I have literally not got one thing accomplished since getting to my room 45 minutes ago.

Every now and then everyone gets a case of procrastination, especially college students. But, rest assured there are ways to avoid procrastination; you just have to know what kind of procrastinator you are.

(iStockphoto)

(iStockphoto)

According to an entry I read on PsyBlog, a main reason for procrastination is low task value.

“Tasks that are unpleasant because they’re boring can be made more difficult artificially to help us avoid procrastination, say by using time limits or unusual conditions,” says PsyBlog.

In other words, if you don’t enjoy the subject in which you are forced to work on, try and make it something manageable. Partner up with someone or set a time limit where you say, “Okay I’m going to work on this for 45 minutes and then take a 15 minute break.”

Another leading contributor to procrastination is being confused. If you’re given an assignment and are confused for whatever reason on the subject matter, then you aren’t as willing to start working on it. After all, no one likes feeling confused.

The only way to dig yourself out of this is to simply talk to a professor. You have their email; use it. You would be surprised how helpful reaching out to a professor can be.

The twenty-first century has introduced a whole new form of procrastination that never existed; I call this technology procrastination. This includes social media, cell phones, video games, and televisions. Myself and several thousand other college students fall victim to this type of procrastination everyday.

A word of advice- turn the TV off, log out of Facebook, and put your phone on silent. You would not believe the amount you’ll get done.

And most importantly- do not plan on procrastinating. If you catch yourself saying something like “I can’t work on my lab that night because I’m going to be up till 3AM working on my linguistics paper” then you really have a problem because you are planning on procrastinating. If you can plan to procrastinate then you can plan to get a paper done a day or two ahead of time.

We’re all guilty of procrastinating; I probably have done it five or six times while writing this article alone. There are ways to not procrastinate; but the responsibility rests on your shoulders.

Are you a procrastinator? Tell me what you do to procrastinate, OR tell me what you do to keep your self from not procrastinating. Comment below or hit me up on Twitter! @THE_SamDeJesus.

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