Time Perspective, Intended Academic Engagement, and Academic Performance

Abstract

Time perspective theory addresses how individuals’ emphasis on past, present, and future events influence their behavior. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between time perspective and academic performance among college students using longitudinal, official GPA data, while also considering students’ intended academic engagement—that is, their stated intention to engage in academically beneficial behavior toward the beginning of the semester. Overall, the future, present-hedonistic, present-fatalistic, and past-negative time perspectives were associated with intended academic engagement, while only the future, present-fatalistic and past-negative time perspectives were associated with GPA in the subsequent two semesters. However, only the future time perspective was a unique predictor of intended academic engagement and GPA. Furthermore, intended academic engagement was found to mediate the relationship between future time perspective and GPA after one semester but not two semesters. The results underscore the importance of the future time perspective in relation to academic performance.