نگاهی دقیقتر به روابط بین تعلل خصلتی، روان رنجوری و وظیفه شناسی

This study with academically-undecided college students investigated the relationships among trait procrastination and two Big Five personality factors, Neuroticism and Conscientiousness. Results from structural equation modeling analyses comparing two hypothesized mediation models favored a model with Conscientiousness as a mediator over a model with procrastination as a mediator. The Conscientiousness mediator model accounted for 24% of the variance in trait procrastination. Bootstrapping procedures indicated the significance of the mediation effect.

Trait procrastination, which is “the tendency to postpone that which is necessary to reach some goal” (Lay, 1986, p. 475), is a strong predictor of students’ dilatory behaviors (Lay & Schouwenburg, 1993), and is associated with detrimental consequences, including poor grades (Rothblum, Solomon, & Murakami, 1986), course withdrawals (Beswick, Rothblum, & Mann, 1988), and delay in completing dissertations (Muszynski & Akamatsu, 1991). Given the adverse effects, understanding personality correlates of procrastination would advance researchers and practitioners’ knowledge base on the construct. 1.1. Procrastination and personality correlates Trait procrastination is consistently associated with both Neuroticism (N) and Conscientiousness (C) of the Five-Factor Model of Personality (Johnson and Bloom, 1995, Lay et al., 1998, Milgram and Tenne, 2000 and Schouwenburg and Lay, 1995). N is defined as a tendency to feel negative emotions and psychological distress (e.g., anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem) and C refers to a tendency to be organized and persistent in pursuing goals (Costa & McCrae, 1991). The procrastination literature suggests that N is positively correlated with procrastination, with rs ranging from 0.18 to 0.42 ( Johnson and Bloom, 1995, Milgram et al., 1993, Schouwenburg and Lay, 1995 and Watson, 2001). Similarly, C has a strong inverse relationship with trait procrastination, with rs ranging from −0.57 to −0.79 ( Costa and McCrae, 1992, Johnson and Bloom, 1995, Lay et al., 1998, Scher and Osterman, 2002 and Schouwenburg and Lay, 1995). There is a modest to moderate inverse relationship of N and C, with rs ranging from −0.28 to −0.49 ( Bailley and Ross, 1996, Costa et al., 1991, Johnson and Bloom, 1995, Milgram and Tenne, 2000 and Ross et al., 2002). In essence, there are moderate to strong correlations among procrastination, neuroticism, and conscientiousness. Given the intercorrelations, it is of interest to examine the mechanism by which procrastination is related to N and C. Based on the literature review, two hypothesized mediation models are postulated: (a) procrastination mediates the relationship of N and C (Model 1), and (b) C mediates the link between N and procrastination (Model 2). 1.1.1. Procrastination mediator model Ross et al. (2002) reported that dispositional self-handicapping (presumably encompassing trait procrastination) significantly mediated the relationship of N and C using a partial correlation strategy. They argued that “higher levels of Neuroticism (including anxiety and indecisional procrastination) lead to an avoidance of threat stimuli (like manifest as task avoidance procrastination) which would be evoked by approaching achievement situations [facets of conscientiousness]” (p. 1182). They further asserted that despite the presumed orthogonal nature of N and C (Costa & McCrae, 1992), there are still considerable correlations between the two constructs, suggesting a possible mediation effect of dispositional self-handicapping. Two issues remain dubious regarding their conclusions. First, is it theoretically sound to postulate that a lower-order trait such as self-handicapping (or procrastination) mediates the association between two higher-order personality factors such as N and C? Second, the partial correlation strategy is not a robust statistical method to test a mediation effect because it does not assess measurement errors. Structural equation modeling approach is favored over a simple regression-based method for testing mediation (see Frazier, Tix, & Barron, 2004). 1.1.2. Conscientiousness mediator model Based on Eysenck’s (1947) hierarchical structure of personality, trait procrastination could be a lower-order trait that is influenced by higher-order traits (Carttell, 1962). Thus, it is reasonable to infer that N predicts trait procrastination (Steel, Brothen, & Wambach, 2001). Individuals high on N may easily feel overwhelmed by tasks and be distracted by unimportant activities, which may lead to their procrastinating tendencies. In this vein, C (a higher-order factor) could be conceptualized to influence trait procrastination (a lower-order factor) (Lay, 1997); accordingly, it can be hypothesized that individuals low on C are more likely to procrastinate. Regarding the relationship of N and C, Milgram and Tenne (2000) suggested that high N is predictive of chronic decisional procrastination; whereas, low C predicts chronic task procrastination. The researchers noted that “we cannot decide when we will do something until we have decided to do it, to begin with” (p. 145). Based on this perspective, it can be inferred that N predicts C (rather than C predicts N), particularly in predicting trait procrastination. Neurotic individuals may be more likely to delay in decision making, which may be manifested as a lack of organization and persistence in pursuing goals. One critical issue centers on the presumed orthogonal nature of N and C (Costa & McCrae, 1992). Specifically, some people may question whether it is conceptually sound to assume that the two orthogonal personality factors can predict each other; they might assert that the relationship of N and C would be best described by a simple, reciprocal correlation/covariance. For example, Johnson and Bloom (1995) suspected that an inverse relationship of N and C (r = −0.28, p < .001) might result from their shared variability (or error variance). However, we argue that this issue remains unresolved. According to Costa and McCrae’s (1992) report of the factor structure of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI-R) scale using varimax-rotated principal components analysis, several facets of N were cross-loaded on C (e.g., factor loadings for Impulsivity facet [−0.32] and Vulnerability facet [−0.38], respectively) and two facets of C were cross-loaded on N (Competence facet [−0.41] and Self-Discipline facet [−0.33]), which casts doubt to the orthogonal nature of N and C. Moreover, a recent study by Johnson and Krueger (2004) suggested that C possess little coherent etiologic factor structure and did not reveal good fit to the common pathway model; whereas, N fits well with a common pathway model where genetic and environmental influence affects the latent factor that is well represented by its factor descriptors. For example, within the Conscientiousness factor, the descriptor responsible loaded on both Conscientiousness and Agreeableness. Similarly, intelligent had a secondary loading on Neuroticism. Taken together, unlike N, C may not possess a coherent factor structure and some facets of C would be loaded on other factors, which questions the orthogonal relationship of N and C. 1.1.3. Purpose of the study The present study aims to investigate the mechanism that relates trait procrastination to neuroticism and conscientiousness. By comparing the two hypothesized mediation models using structural equation modeling, this study could answer the following questions: (a) which is a mediator, conscientiousness (a higher-order factor) or procrastination (a lower-order factor), and (b) is the mediation effect significant?