Decisional and Behavioral Procrastination: How They Relate to Self-Discrepancies

A self-discrepancy is a gap between the perceived real self and other standards like the ideal self. One hundred and eighty-one college students completed a self-report measure of self-discrepancies and decisional and behavioral procrastination. Regression analysis showed that overall dysfunctional procrastination (the composite measure of both kinds of procrastination) significantly varied as a function of self-discrepancies. The amount of variance explained was small. Those scoring high in self-discrepancies were more likely to be dysfunctional procrastinators than those scoring low. The discrepancy between the actual-self and the ought-to self was the strongest predictor of dysfunctional procrastination. When decisional and behavioral procrastination were analyzed separately, only decisional procrastination significantly varied as a function of self-discrepancies.