The Effects of Procrastination and Self-Awareness on Emotional Self-Regulation Lauren Nicholson Stephen F. A ustin State University

Background Methods •They received a debriefing for m w hich informed them of the fictitious conversation and that there •Participants = 49 college students recruited The first independent variable was Pr ocrastination. was a real drawing that they will be entered into Past research has suggested two main reasons for why from the Psychology Department at Stephen F . students procrastinate. First, fear of failure, and second, Austin State University task aversiveness Solomon and Rothblum (1984, as cited Procrastination was assessed using a Results modified version of Aitken’s Academic in Ferrari et al; 1995) •A 2 (procrastination) x 2 (self-awareness) ANOVA The second independent variable w as Self-awareness, Procrastination Scale (APS, 1982). T he modified showed which is defined as attention focused inward (Scheier & version consisted of 11 of the original 19 Carver, 1977).An impor tant extension of ear ly self- questions interspersed among a larger body of •no significant main effects for procrastination or self- awareness research by Scheier and Carver (1977) 30 other items. Scores falling in the range of 33 awareness suggested that “self-awareness clarifies internal states to 55 will be an indication of chronic •Gender and emotional self-regulation did not correlate, such as attitudes, sensations, and emotions. As a result, procrastination while scores falling in the range r(48) = 0.06; p>0.05 so no covariate was included in emotions should be more salient, and subjectively from 11 to 32 signified an individual as being a ANOVA experienced mor e intensely, w hen attention is focused on the self.” less chronic procrastinator . •A nearly significant interaction was found between Self-Awareness was represented by the The dependent variable was Self-r egulation which is procrastination and self-awareness F(1,48) = 3.75, p=.06. termed as the pr ocess by w hich people control or alter presence or absence of a mirror. A trend was found in the high self-awareness condition. their thoughts, emotions, and behaviors (O aten & Cheng, •High self-awareness = mirror present Refer to the graph means for all conditions. 2005). Oaten and Cheng (2005) found that when people •Low self-awar eness = no mirr or present, only a who were under academic stress reported breakdowns in poster regulatory behavior that wer e not seen in the contr ol Emotional state was assessed using Diener Means for all Conditions group of the experiment. and Emmons’ Composite Affect Scale (1985, as The current experiment investigated how a person’s cited in Pychyl et al., 2000) . This scale consists emotions were affected by procrastination and being of nine adjectives which were rated by the 10 self—aware in a stress (frustration) inducing situation. participants on a seven-point Likert scale (1=not 8 at all to 7=extremely much). Four adjectives 8 (happy, joyful, pleased and enjoyment/fun) Design and Hypotheses 6 Less Chronic represented a positive affect. The other five Pr ocras tinator adjectives (depressed, unhappy, frustrated, 3.3 4 Chronic I implemented a 2 (Procrastination) x 2 (Self- angry/hostile and worr ied/anxious) represented 1.94 Awareness) between subjects factorial design. Pr ocras tinator the negative affect. The difference score was Emotional State 2 0. 7 Procrastination ( IV #1) consisted of two levels: less then taken by subtracting the average negative 0 chronic and chronic as measured using a standardized score from the average positive score. survey. Self-Awareness (IV #2) also consisted of two 1 2 levels: high and low. The high self- awareness condition Low High was represented by the presence of a mirr or, while in the Procedure low self-awareness condition ther e w as no mirror present, Self-Awarene ss only a poster on the wall. T he dependent variable w as •Participants were given the infor med consent emotional self-regulation. •Participants were given the Student Characteristics questionnaire Hypothesis #1 • Participants were then given an anagram task Discussion Those who were chronic procrastinators in the high self- in w hich they were given 8 minutes complete, awareness condition w ith a mirror present would score but told that it usually took only 3 to 4 As predicted, chronic procrastinators in the high self- most negatively on the Measuring Internal emotion (Anagrams arranged by increasing difficulty, awareness condition w ith a mirror present reported more Questionnaire. with one being impossible) negatively. The results may suggest that a chronic •Participants were also informed that they would procrastinator’s mood may be effected negatively when Hypothesis #2 be entered into a drawing for a $50 gas card if made aware of their emotional state. The results upheld Regardless of procrastination level, those in the low self- they finished the task the “salience hypothesis” which states that a person’s awareness condition w ith out a mirror present would •Students were then ushered to their testing emotions become more apparent through self-awareness. score more positively on the Measuring Internal Emotion room which contained either a poster (low self- Questionnaire. Unlike what w as predicted, the less chronic awareness condition) or a mirror (high self- procrastinators in the high self-awareness condition, with References awareness condition) a mirror present, reported most positively. This possibly •Participants began to w ork on the anagram task suggest that less chronic procrastinators are better at •4 minutes into the 8 minute period a loud and Oaten, M., & Cheng, K. (2005). Academ ic exam ination regulating their emotions when under stressful situations. stress impairs self control. Journal of Soci al interesting pre-planned conversation took place and Clinical Psychology, 24(2), 254-279. to allow for distraction Future Research •After the eight minutes ended the r esearcher Scheier, M. F., & Carver, C. S . (1977). S el f-focused came by to pick up the anagram tasks and Future research should investigate different at tention and the experi ence of emot ion: sources/types of self-awareness, the effects on positive A ttraction, repulsion, elati on, and depression. hand out the Measuring Internal Emotion Journal of Personalit y and Social P sychol ogy, Questionnaire or negative emotional salience, and which sources have 35(9), 625- 636. •The participants filled out the Measuring the largest influence on emotional salience. Internal Emotion Questionnaire Ferrari, J. R., Johnson, J. L., & McCown, W. (1995). P rocrastination and t ask avoidance theory, research, and t reatment. New York: Plenum Press.