Time Management Problems Research Articles

Time Management of Slovak Managers

The following article deals with the problem of time management in the life of the manager. Time is very valuable commodity and lot of managers feel that they do not have enough time to do their jobs to their full potential. The use of time must be explicitly managed, just like money. The goal of our research was the examination of the efficient use of the main principles of time management in the life of the manager. Research was done among 253 managers from different companies operating in Slovakia. The theoretical part of this article is concerned mainly with concepts such as the generations of time management, the relation between satisfaction and performance, satisfaction as the goal of the fourth generation of time management. The result of the research of the given problem is a collection of practical recommendations for efficient time management.

The Effects of Previous Misestimation of Task Duration on Estimating Future Task Duration

It is a common time management problem that people underestimate the duration of tasks, which has been termed the “planning fallacy.” To overcome this, it has been suggested that people should be informed about how long they previously worked on the same task. This study, however, tests whether previous misestimation also affects the duration estimation of a novel task, even if the feedback is only self-generated. To test this, two groups of participants performed two unrelated, laboratory-based tasks in succession. Learning was manipulated by permitting only the experimental group to retrospectively estimate the duration of the first task before predicting the duration of the second task. Results showed that the experimental group underestimated the duration of the second task less than the control group, which indicates a general kind of learning from previous misestimation. The findings imply that people could be trained to carefully observe how much they misestimate task duration in order to stimulate learning. The findings are discussed in relation to the anchoring account of task duration misestimation and the memory-bias account of the planning fallacy.

Avoiding procrastination through time management: an experimental intervention study

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a short-term time management intervention on procrastination. Procrastination is a serious issue for many students and associated with different negative consequences, such as anxiety or low grades. As procrastination is described as a self-regulatory failure, a training programme focussing on self-regulatory skills might be helpful. We randomly assigned 96 students to a treatment (n = 47) and a control group (n = 49). As hypothesised, participants of the control group showed procrastination: they spent more time on a self-selected, important academic task right before the deadline was reached compared to the weeks before. The participants of the treatment group, instead, allocated their work time more equally and did not show procrastination. Therefore, the explored time management intervention prevents from a serious time management problem.

Psychometric Properties of the Revised Chen Internet Addiction Scale (CIAS-R) in Chinese Adolescents

The Revised Chen Internet Addiction Scale (CIAS-R) was developed to assess Internet addiction in Chinese populations, but its psychometric properties in adolescents have not been examined. This study aimed to evaluate the factor structure and psychometric properties of CIAS-R in Hong Kong Chinese adolescents. 860 Grade 7 to 13 students (38% boys) completed the CIAS-R, the Young's Internet Addiction Test (IAT), and the Health of the Nation Outcome Scales for Children and Adolescents (HoNOSCA) in a survey. The prevalence of Internet addiction as assessed by CIAS-R was 18%. High internal consistency and inter-item correlations were reported for the CIAS-R. Results from the confirmatory factor analysis suggested a four-factor structure of Compulsive Use and Withdrawal, Tolerance, Interpersonal and Health-related Problems, and Time Management Problems. Moreover, results of hierarchical multiple regression supported the incremental validity of the CIAS-R to predict mental health outcomes beyond the effects of demographic differences and self-reported time spent online. The CIAS is a reliable and valid measure of internet addiction problems in Hong Kong adolescents. Future study is warranted to validate the cutoffs of the CIAS-R for identification of adolescents with Internet use problems who may have mental health needs.

The Effect of a Nurse-Directed Intervention to Reduce Pain and Improve Behavioral and Physical Outcomes in Patients With Critically Colonized/Infected Chronic Leg Ulcers

We compared a WOC nurse-directed, patient-centered intervention called MECALF (motivational enhancement and conditioning activity for leg function) compared to conditioning activities for lower leg function (CALF) alone. Outcomes were study feasibility, pain, motivation, self-efficacy, physical activity, leg strength, and range of motion. Comparative study. The sample was drawn from 2 wound centers in the Southeastern United States. Twenty-one patients (n = 12 MECALF site A and n = 9 CALF site B) with painful lower legs and critically colonized/infected wounds participated in the study. All patients received usual wound care per center protocol. The MECALF intervention was delivered by WOC nurses for 6 weeks at site A and a handout of CALF depicting the conditioning activities was provided by site staff (not WOC nurses) to patients at site B. We assessed study feasibility with postsurvey questionnaires given to WOC nurses (training usefulness, ease of use of ME with patients) and subjects (able to perform activities, use logs). Pre- and postintervention outcome data were collected by study staff using pain, motivation, and self-efficacy scales, functional measures of physical activity, and physical measures of strength and range of motion. The study was found to be somewhat feasible by the WOC nurses and patients. WOC nurses had time management problems using MECALF during usual patient care. Patients reported that they were able to perform CALF. Overall pain was statistically significantly reduced (P = .046) in both groups of patients with painful critically colonized/infected leg ulcers measured at week 8, 2 weeks after the study period. The CALF group experienced a slightly greater reduction in pain intensity than did the MECALF group. No statistically significant differences between the groups were observed in behavioral outcomes for motivation (P = .641) and self-efficacy (P = .643), or for physical outcomes including overall ankle strength (P = .609) and ankle range of motion (P = .498). Functional and physical activity scores revealed no statistically significant differences in 3 measures, including Timed Up and Go test (P = .624), Timed Chair Standing Test (P = .686), or the Community Health Activities Model for Seniors (P = .803). While somewhat feasible to implement in the wound care setting, no improvement in outcomes was observed with the addition of the WOC nurse-directed intervention. However, pain in the lower legs of patients with critically colonized/infected wounds in both groups improved after a 6-week behavioral/physical activity intervention. A larger trial is needed to further elucidate these findings.

Maldivian secondary teachers’ reflections on their first year of teaching: Enabling factors, perceived problems and proposed solutions

This study investigated the reflections on the first year teaching of 10 beginning secondary teachers with a Bachelor of Teaching Secondary qualification through open ended questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. The participants identified the high levels of student motivation and good student performance in their classes, constructive feedback from the school management and establishment of positive relationships with colleagues as enabling factors. The problems these beginning teachers faced include classroom management issues, time management problems, dealing with special needs students, being under-prepared for real classroom situations, high workload and low salary, dealing with parents, lack of status in the school, lack of resources, dealing with their own emotions and being subject to internal and external policies. Implications for teachers training include establishing support groups to help beginning teachers make the transition from pre-service to in-service teachers, evaluating the teacher preparation curriculum to incorporate coping strategies, improving some school related factors and providing them with more practice before they become fully fledged teachers.

Loneliness, self‐esteem, and life satisfaction as predictors of Internet addiction: A cross‐sectional study among Turkish university students

This study investigated the relationship among loneliness, self-esteem, life satisfaction, and Internet addiction. Participants were 384 university students (114 males, 270 females) from 18 to 24 years old from the faculty of education in Turkey. The Internet Addiction, UCLA Loneliness, Self-esteem, and Life Satisfaction scales were distributed to about 1000 university students, and 38.4% completed the survey (see Appendix A and B). It was found that loneliness, self-esteem, and life satisfaction explained 38% of the total variance in Internet addiction. Loneliness was the most important variable associated with Internet addiction and its subscales. Loneliness and self-esteem together explained time-management problems and interpersonal and health problems while loneliness, self-esteem, and life satisfaction together explained only the interpersonal and health problems subscales.

Poster Abstracts

Poster Abstracts

Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder at Work: Does It Impact Job Performance?

The article focuses on Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), which affects a substantial proportion of the adult population and it often remains undiagnosed. Because of its symptoms, which include inability to focus and maintain attention, problems in time management and procrastination, ADHD is suspected as a cause of poor performance in the workplace. A recent contemplation suggests a mechanism for that: employees with ADHD may perform less well because they are unable to focus their attention at tasks that have a long-term consequence for job accomplishment, but they instead pay attention at tasks that require immediate attention, such as responding to a low priority e-mail, but are of less long-term importance for the job. In essence, this means that employees with ADHD may still demonstrate strong effort, but they are unable to translate that effort into actual work performance because they focus on low value-adding tasks. A series of studies have provided substantial support for that reasoning. The studies not only confirmed that ADHD is associated with reduced job performance, but they also demonstrated that ADHD does not allow employee effort to translate into performance on the job. What the findings also implied is that those with ADHD are probably unaware that their effort does not translate into performance, so they keep working inefficiently, albeit hard. The findings make important implications for practice and how to deal with ADHD in the workplace, given that ADHD may be affecting one in ten workers.

Kokybiniai vartotojų elgsenos tyrimai internete: metodologiniai iššūkiai

The aim of this paper is to reveal and discuss the methodological issues related to online qualitative consumer behavior research. A number of methodological issues are examined, related with the online qualitative research on consumer in-store emotional experience implemented by the authors. It is concluded that the Internet is becoming an increasingly attractive environment for consumer behavior research. A large part of scholars use the Internet as a medium for data collection and analysis. At the same time, researchers study the Internet as a source of information about consumer preferences, their virtual communities, prevailing relationships, traditions and attitudes. The Internet is analyzed as a phenomenon in itself, too. In this article, the Internet is analyzed as a tool for communicating with research participants, and collecting, storing and analyzing data. In general, qualitative inquiry is characterized by contextual and naturalistic approach to the study of objects and processes. Therefore, decision to carry out qualitative study in virtual environment must take additional strategic and tactical solutions. Most often, researchers need to decide about the mode of communication that solves time management, spontaneity and security problems. It is also relevant to sampling and its contents. Different solutions from quantitative studies are required in ensuring the ethics and quality of the study. During the analysis of the qualitative data collected through the Internet, mostly in a form of computer communication language (text), specific characteristics, such as backspacing and correction during the communication that impact spontaneity rate, the absence of non-verbal language, etc., are necessary to be taken into accountIt is concluded that all the above-mentioned issues must be addressed individually to the research topic, object, aim, research problem and the specifics of the respondents. When deciding about the method of communication, it is important to assess which synchronous or asynchronous communication method is appropriate for the study participants. This decision relates to both computer literacy and psychological and personal factors of the researcher and a person involved. Asynchronous communication eliminates “rush” factor and solves organizational problems. Decision about communication synchronicity is closely associated with the interaction anonymity level. When the research question covers sensitive topics, on which the respondents may find it difficult to talk, it is recommended to choose the anonymous environment that encourages communication to be more open and free. In this case, it is likely preferable to use an asynchronous communication mode.On the basis of the analysis, it is concluded that qualitative research online population perception and evaluation differ from the reality research. The differences here relate to geographical uncertainty, cyberspace users’ sex, age, social status and other demographic characteristics intangibility. One way to solve the problem mentioned, especially in cases, where the investigation is carried out in the wider population, is to avoid studying as the unit of analysis individuals, and to choose unit of analysis as social interactions (e.g. unsuccessful purchases, in-store conflict, etc.), social artifacts (e.g. advertising) and so on.Ethical concerns analysis showed that although the online investigator is less constrained by the structure, space and time of communication, virtual environment complicates some ethical solutions (e.g. receiving informed consent). It is concluded that in cases, where the object of investigation or research field is not associated with sensitive aspects of personal life, there is no threat or harmful consequences for research participants and analyzes the generic nature of the problem, the study participants’ voluntary participation is seen as an implied consent. The study participant’s consent is difficult to obtain and can be excluded when data is collected anonymously. By using pseudonyms and responsibly citing the study participants’ computer communication language (text), confidentiality can be achieved.The authors indicate some limitations of the article. They examined the issues identified only in the context of a particular research and more samples were not discussed. This prevents access to general conclusions and contributes only in small aspects of the field. On the other side, each attempt to analyze Internet specificity caused issues lead to methodological qualitative online research perspicuity, research validity and reliability improvement.

Time: An Empirical Analysis of Law Student Time Management Deficiencies

This Article begins the much needed research on law students’ time famine. Time management complaints begin early in students’ legal education and generally go unresolved. As a result, practicing attorneys identify time famine as a leading cause of job dissatisfaction. To better arm graduating students, law schools must treat time as an essential component of practice-readiness. Unfortunately, most law schools ignore their students’ time management concerns, despite growing calls for greater “skills” training in legal education. To date, legal scholarship has overlooked psychological research on time management. Yet, this research is an essential starting point to effective instruction. Rather than viewing time management as a singular concept, this research shows it is actually multi-dimensional, compromised of multiple time structure skills and behaviors. This more nuanced understanding of time management means each dimension can be isolated, measured, and remediated. Rather than a shotgun approach, law schools can tailor instruction to law students’ specific deficiencies.To help identify these deficiencies, this Article presents a psychometric study of 1Ls – the first study to ever quantify law students’ time management problems. The study identifies five specific dimensions 1Ls lack: perceived control, present orientation, structured routine, goal setting, and mechanics. Using this information, the Article offers tailored advice on incorporating skills across the curriculum to help remedy these deficiencies. By learning foundational time management skills during law school, students have at least a fighting chance of managing time famine in practice.

Evaluation Of The Distance Education Pre-Service Teachers' Opinions About Teaching Practice Course (Case Of Izmir City)

The aim of this study was to determine the distance education pre-service teachers’ opinions about the teaching practice course. The study was conducted with descriptive method. For data collection, analysis and interpretation, qualitative research method was used. Out of the students enrolled at Open Education Faculty, Department of Pre-school Education and Department of English Language Teaching, 27 students were volunteer to participate to the study. As a result of the study; it was found that some of the distance education pre-service teachers felt ready and enthusiastic about the teaching practice course albeit others did not feel ready enough. In addition, the pre-service teachers mostly mentioned about their expectations for self-development and self-evaluation. The pre-service teachers considered that this course provided them the opportunities to know the students and learning environments, also to prepare the plans effectively, to learn about teaching-learning processes, to manage class and time, to benefit from coordinator teachers and to evaluate themselves. However, they also complained about lack of information about plans and teaching practice files, difficulties in class-management, problems in efficient time-management, indifference of the coordinator teachers, inadequate equipment at application schools; lack of supervision and limited opportunity to have experience. Thus, they suggested that the coordinator teachers should be trained considering these problems also the application should be selected after physical check; besides the pre-service teachers should be supervised and provided accurate samples about plan and field preparation, thus frequent contact meetings should be arranged.

Patterns of Time Processing Ability in Children with and without Developmental Disabilities

Background Children with developmental disabilities, e.g. intellectual disability or autism, are reported to have problems in time perception, time orientation or time management, i.e. in time‐processing ability (TPA). The aim was to investigate whether the problems described are diagnosis specific or reflect differences in age or in level of TPA.Methods Using a cross‐sectional design, this study investigated if there were different patterns of TPA in 5‐ to 10‐year‐old children with (n = 77) and without disabilities (n = 89). The results indicated that the patterns of TPA mainly follow the chronological age of children without disabilities, all clusters differing as regards levels of TPA. Daily time management (as estimated by the parents) and children’s self‐rated autonomy differed between clusters and was related to TPA.Conclusions The level of TPA seems to be a more valid overall base than the type of diagnosis for the planning of interventions in daily time management.

What's Advertising Content Worth? Evidence from a Consumer Credit Marketing Field Experiment*

Firms spend billions of dollars developing advertising content, yet there is little field evidence on how much or how it affects demand. We analyze a direct mail field experiment in South Africa implemented by a consumer lender that randomized advertising content, loan price, and loan offer deadlines simultaneously. We find that advertising content significantly affects demand. Although it was difficult to predict ex ante which specific advertising features would matter most in this context, the features that do matter have large effects. Showing fewer example loans, not suggesting a particular use for the loan, or including a photo of an attractive woman increases loan demand by about as much as a 25% reduction in the interest rate. The evidence also suggests that advertising content persuades by appealing “peripherally” to intuition rather than reason. Although the advertising content effects point to an important role for persuasion and related psychology, our deadline results do not support the psychological prediction that shorter deadlines may help overcome time-management problems; instead, demand strongly increases with longer deadlines.

‘Mind the gap’: An empirical study of the gap between intention and actual usage of corporate e‐learning programmes in the financial industry

AbstractWhile numerous previous studies have focused on the use of some corporate e‐learning programmes (CELP), little is known about the difference between users’ pre‐installation reactions to CELP and user's post‐installation reactions to CELP. This study narrows the above gap with two investigations into a financial company's CELP. In the pre‐installation phase, we surveyed users' need for cognition, attitudes towards corporate e‐learning and intentions for the use of corporate e‐learning (INT) in relation to the CELP. Ten months after the installation, we conducted a second investigation to examine learning outcomes on the basis of users' perceptions of CELP utility, CELP satisfaction, affective reaction to CELP and the actual CELP usage (UGE). We examined the proposed model with multiple regression analyses and found a gap between INT and UGE. The second investigation identified potential factors that contributed to the differences in UGE between two groups of high‐INT learners. Results indicated that time management and technical problems were the two critical factors that led to UGE differences. Findings of this study can illuminate relationships among learners' attitudes, usage and reaction towards the CELP.

The Career Paths of Women (and Men) in French Research

This paper presents results from a qualitative study of perceptions of science careers in the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), the main research institution in France. Its aim is to understand the 'glass ceiling' effect, which reduces the proportion of women at the higher levels of the career hierarchy. Long interviews were carried out with men, as well as women, support staff and researchers. Factors such as tension between individual and collective dimensions of research activity, and long-term time-management problems, were identified: these affect both men and women but in different ways. Organizations bear an important responsibility through the way they reinforce or alleviate difficulties that women and men face in contributing to scientific research at all levels.

The influence of students and teachers characteristics on the efficacy of face-to-face and computer supported collaborative learning

In this paper we compared the efficacy of face-to-face and computer supported collaborative learning (CSCL) in increasing academic knowledge and professional competences. We also explored how students’ personality characteristics and learning strategies and teachers’ characteristics were associated with better learning outcomes in online or face-to-face contexts. One hundred and seventy students participated in 10 community psychology seminars, five online and five face-to-face. Academic and professional learning increased for participants in both settings. Tutors’ characteristics did not influence students’ learning. Students who performed better in online and in face-to-face contexts differed in some psychological variables and in their learning strategies. Overall results show that asynchronous collaborative learning online can increase professional competences normally learnt only in small face-to-face educational settings, and that CSCL can be used to provide innovative educational opportunities that fit particular needs of students with low anxiety, high problem solving efficacy, who have time management problems in their learning strategies.

A Unified Theory of Timing Budget Management

This paper presents a theoretical framework that solves optimally and in polynomial time many open problems in time budgeting. The approach unifies a large class of existing time-management paradigms. Examples include time budgeting for maximizing total weighted delay relaxation, minimizing the maximum relaxation, and min-skew time budget distribution. The authors develop a combinatorial framework through which we prove that many of the time-management problems can be transformed into a min-cost flow problem instance. The methodology is applied to intellectual-property-based datapath synthesis targeting field-programmable gate arrays. The synthesis flow maps the input operations to parameterized library modules during which different time budgeting policies have been applied. The techniques always improve the area requirement of the implemented test benches and consistently outperform a widely used competitor. The experiments verify that combining fairness and maximization objectives improves the results further as compared with pure maximum budgeting. The combined fairness and maximization objective improves the area by 25.8% and 28.7% in slice and LUT counts, respectively.

Difficulties encountered at the beginning of professional life: results of a 2003 pilot survey among undergraduate students in Paris Rene Descartes University (France)

In addition to dental hospital clinical activity, dental students at Paris Rene Descartes University have the opportunity in their final year of study to practise clinically in a dental office, as associates. This paper outlines a pilot, experimental study designed to assess student reaction to this Vocational Clinical Activity (VCA) in order to identify relevant weaknesses of the undergraduate programme. Using questionnaires, data were collected for each of the following clinical or management skills: clinical difficulty, therapeutic decision-making, patient/practitioner relationship, time management, administrative matters and technical problems. Students were asked to rank each item in order of difficulty (1, high level to 6, low level). A high response rate was observed (90%) among the 50 undergraduate VCA students. The results pointed out three main difficulties encountered by undergraduate students during the VCA: time management (90% of the students), administrative matters (85% of the students) and clinical decision-making (80% of the students). These preliminary results need further investigation. However, they give us the incentive to carry on with this type of assessment and to extend it to young, qualified colleagues' perceptions and to other French Universities.

Eclipse and CVS for group projects

Group projects can be difficult for the instructor to evaluate; students, also, complain about time management and member participation problems. However, working in groups can be valuable for learning course material as well as developing skills vital in the workplace. This paper explores how the open source version control system, CVS, can be used to help students work together with less dependence on synchronous meetings; instructors can also use the system to monitor group member contributions.