The Relationship between Postgraduates' Academic Procrastination and Psychodynamic Variables

Abstract

Academic procrastination refers to the tendency to procrastinate academic tasks, and the concomitant negative emotions. Based on questionnaire surveys of 305 postgraduate students, the study investigated the relationship between academic procrastination and three psychodynamic variables- achievement motivation, goal orientation and academic self-efficacy through path analyses. Main results included: (1) Academic procrastination is a common phenomenon among the postgraduates, nearly 60% of them having the procrastination tendency, while almost all of them having the desire to reduce procrastination. The female postgraduates showed a higher level of academic procrastination than the male postgraduates. (2) Academic procrastination level is correlated with different dimensions of the three psychodynamic variables. (3) The psychodynamic variables contribute to academic procrastination level by three ways. First, achievement motivation, goal orientation, and academic self-efficacy directly contribute to academic procrastination negatively. Second, goal orientation and academic self-efficacy contribute to academic procrastination through achievement motivation. Third, goal orientation contributes to achievement motivation through academic self-efficacy, which then contributes to academic procrastination. Achievement motivation may act as a med iating factor. Implications for educators were discussed based on these findings. Index Terms - academic procrastination, achievement motivation, goal orientation, academic self-efficacy