GRASP
The reasons we procrastinate
November 19th, 2025, by
Have you ever found yourself avoiding an important task, even though you know you’ll be worse off for it? Perhaps you’ve sat down to finish your draft chapter, only to work on something else instead while knowing your supervisor is hoping to read it next week. Maybe you have struggled to send out those survey recruitment emails. If so, you’re not alone - procrastination is a common challenge for many of us. The good news is, it’s a habit that can be changed.
This post is the first in a three-part series exploring what procrastination is, the costs of procrastinating, and why we procrastinate even when we know it’s unhelpful. The series is based on the research of Tim Pychyl, a procrastination expert at Carleton University.
What do we mean by procrastination?
Pychyl defines procrastination as:
“The voluntary delay of an intended action despite expecting to be worse off for the delay.”
In other words, procrastination means choosing to put off something you intend to do, even though you know it will have negative consequences.
Not all delay is procrastination
It’s important to distinguish procrastination from other types of delay:
- Purposeful delay: Sometimes, postponing a task is rational and beneficial - for example, waiting to finish a chapter until you’ve read some essential articles.
- Inevitable delay: Life happens. Circumstances may force you to delay - for example, your child is ill, or your interview participant can’t make the appointment.
- Delay due to emotional issues: Some tasks may be difficult to tackle at a given moment because of emotional barriers - for example, you’re upset about some negative feedback from a reviewer and need time to process it before tackling the required changes.
The costs of procrastination
When we procrastinate, we often waste the time we set aside for important tasks. But the costs go beyond lost time. Pychyl’s research identified three main areas affected by procrastination:
- Wellbeing: Guilt over unfinished tasks can turn into shame, impacting self-esteem.
- Physical Health: Chronic procrastination increases stress, which can lead to health problems.
- Performance: There is a correlation between procrastination and performance, although the impact is less severe than that of wellbeing and health.
Being aware of the costs of procrastination can strengthen our resolve to do something about it.
Why do we procrastinate?
Many people believe procrastination is simply a time management issue. If only we were more organised or disciplined, we’d stop procrastinating - right? While good time management is helpful, Pychyl argues that procrastination is fundamentally an emotion regulation problem:
- When faced with tasks we tend to avoid, we experience negative emotions: boredom, frustration, resentment, fear, or stress.
- To escape these feelings, we avoid the task , seeking “short-term mood repair.” In other words, we “give in to feel good.”
- This avoidance provides temporary relief, but ultimately leads to greater stress and regret, and undermines our long-term goals.
So, procrastination isn’t so much about poor planning — it’s about managing our emotions in the moment.
Final reflections
If procrastination is a challenge for you, take a moment to reflect:
- What tasks do you typically delay, and what are the consequences?
- Is procrastination affecting your wellbeing, health, or performance?
- What emotions arise when you face tasks you don’t want to do?
Understanding your own patterns is the first step toward change.
What’s next?
In the next post in this series, I’ll share key strategies from Tim Pychyl’s research to help you combat procrastination. Stay tuned!
Sources used
I’ve drawn upon the arguments presented in Pychyl’s book, Solving the procrastination puzzle: A concise guide to strategies for change, Penguin: New York, 2013, and from his audio series on the Waking Up app.
I’ve also dabbled in the long list of published papers listed on Pychyl’s website.
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Photo by Colin White on Unsplash