Kelly B. Binder &

Timothy A. Pychyl

Carleton University

Although procrastination is common in academic life and many campus counselling centres provide intervention workshops or counselling to help students with this problem, there are few studies examining the effectiveness of this type of treatment. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a campus-based, cognitive-behavioral academic procrastination intervention program. Three groups of students received either treatment workshops (n=15), Personal Proje cts Analysis (PPA; Little, 1983) with no workshops (n=17), or no treatment at all (n=18). The program consisted of six, 2-hour workshops (one pre-session and 5 treatment sessions) over seven weeks in the winter term. Pre- and post-scores for measures of procrastination, life satisfaction, positive and negative affect and various PPA dimensions were used to examine the impact of the workshops on students’ procrastination and subjective well-being (SWB). Results indicated that self-reported pr ocrastination significantly decreased for the treatment group relative to both comparison groups. However, there was no significant change in SWB for any of the three groups. The focus on time management strategies is discussed in relation to issue s of self-regulation in procrastination counseling.

PURPOSE

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which participation in this treatment program:

1. reduced the tendency for students to procrastinate

 

2. resulted in changes in students’ subjective well-being

METHODOLOGY

Participants

1. treatment group (n=15)
2. comparison group with PPA (n=17)
3. comparison group without PPA (n=18)

Materials

• Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS)
• Positive and Negative Affect Scales
• Modified Personal Projects Analysis (PPA)

Testing Procedure

Note: Trt = treatment group

C1 = comparison group w/PPA

C2 = comparison group w/o PPA

Session 1

Session 2

Session 3

Session 4

• check-in: how am I doing now?
• change – is overcoming procrastination a danger or a benefit?
• dyad exercise: breaking down a specific task
• roundtable – discussion of strategies to becoming "unstuck"

Session 5

RESULTS

At the pre-session, all three groups were equivalent in terms of age and procrastination (see Table 1). Females were overrepresented in the treatment group; however, this was unavoidable as this group volunteered on a first come, first enrolled basis.< /P>

Table 1. Age, Gender and PASS: Descriptives Across Groups

A repeated measures ANOVA, using T1 as a covariate for each of the dependent variables, found only the PASS scores (see Table 2) to change significantly for the treatment group relative to both comparison groups (F(2,46)=8.18, p<.001). Between T3 an d T4, pairwise comparisons revealed the mean difference in PASS scores for the treatment group to be significantly less than scores for both comparison groups (D=-4.87, p<.000; D=-4.17, p<.002, respectively). Using paired-samples t-tes ts, within-subjects analysis for the treatment group revealed significance for T1 vs. T3 (t(14)=2.85, p<.01) and T1 vs. T4 (t(14)=3.89, p<.002).

Table 2. Mean PASS Scores Across Groups Over Time

Scores for each of the 16 PPA dimensions were summed across all of the projects and grouped into five major factors: meaning, structure, community, efficacy, and stress. A MANOVA performed on these factors revealed no significant difference between groups.

Table 3. Mean Structure and Community Scores Between Groups Over Time

Using paired-samples t-tests, for both groups separately, only the treatment group revealed within-subjects significance over time across 3 PPA factors: structure, community, and efficacy. The following tables (s ee Tables 4 and 5) provide pre- vs. post-results for all significant PPA factors and dimensions, respectively.

Table 4.

Treatment Group: Paired-Samples T-test Results of Pre- vs. Post- Ratings for all Significant PPA Factors

Note: n.s. = not significant

Table 5.

Treatment Group: Paired-Samples T-test Results of Pre- vs. Post-Ratings for all Significant PPA Dimensions

Note: n.s. = not significant

DISCUSSION

 The results indicate that the cognitive-behavioral treatment program does reduce academic procrastination significantly while students are in the program. The changes in procrastination, however, are relatively small. Pe rhaps greater gains could be made if treatment involved even more emphasis on strategies of self-regulation (e.g., Baumeister, 1994) to help students get started on their projects. The role of volition (e.g., Kuhl, 1993) and theories of action (e.g., Goll witzer, 1996) need to be incorporated more explicitly in treatment strategies.