Procrastination

“Procrastination is the thief of time” wrote the 18^th Century poet, Edward Young – a sentiment that we can all empathise with. We are all capable of finding a myriad of ways to waste time and to put off what we really need to achieve, but, as parents, we become particularly irate when we see procrastination in our sons, fearing that it will prevent them from achieving academic results commensurate with their potential.

I have heard people argue in the past that putting something off until the last minute can be positive, because, when up against a deadline, adrenaline kicks in and we work very efficiently. Indeed, I might, in a candid moment, admit to often leaving the writing of my blog until a Thursday evening when it absolutely needs to get done! However, research suggests that there are clear negative consequences of last-minutism.

Dr Willmott has given me a rapid biology masterclass to explain the physiological consequences. The sense of urgency associated with leaving a task to the last possible minute is facilitated by a surge of adrenaline, which increases heart output and releases sugars into the blood stream. This is connected to the ‘fight or flight’ mechanism required to keep us out of harm’s way, as the primitive human needed the increased blood flow to fight or flee. However, when using adrenaline to meet our deadlines there is no outlet for these sugars, and this can therefore have negative long term health effects such as high blood pressure, weight gain and diabetes.

In addition, there is a growing understanding of the harm that procrastination may have on neurological development among the young. Although current thinking points out that human brains can change at all stages of life, children’s brains are particularly ‘plastic’ as they form new and important neural pathways. Therefore, if a child gets used to procrastination, there is the real risk that this behaviour becomes hard-wired into the brain, hindering long-term intellectual and organisational development.

There appear to be two reasons why procrastination develops in early adolescence. Firstly, adolescents are challenging authority, and procrastination is active resistance to doing what one has been told. But there is also passive resistance in the form of delaying tactics: “I’ll do it in a minute”, which as we know is easily extended. As parents, we are confident that huge amounts of time are being wasted as an unpleasant task (academic or otherwise) is put off.

In university surveys, students claim that the stress induced by procrastination actually enables achievement, and that work ‘done early’ takes longer because there is no pressure to get it done. In reality, however, when they wait until the last minute, they rush through a task because there is no alternative, justifying it to themselves by saying “I work best under pressure.” This is an illusion that we, as teachers and parents must challenge. When hurried, boys are failing to plan, relying on their native wit, and as we know, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. High grades in our public examination system don’t rely merely on knowledge and understanding of your subject, but they also require an appreciation of how to fulfil the marking scheme that requires subtle planning.

As stated above, the stress required to perform at the last minute has negative consequences. In the short-term, the loss of adrenaline once a task is complete drains us of all energy. A student who has ‘pulled an all-nighter’ completing an essay will be inattentive in class and too tired to produce quality homework the next day. The perception of efficiency when under pressure is also illusory; a dedicated ‘last-minuter’ thinks only of 45 minutes spent writing and fails to take into account the hours over the previous days when he has been paralysed by procrastination.

So how can we help an adolescent stop procrastinating? It’s probably unwise to adopt a zero tolerance policy and to admonish him whenever he fails to respond promptly to a request. Instead see if you can call his bluff by anticipating the demand, and asking him some time before you need it to be done. In this way, following your nth reminder, he might actually respond by a time that is acceptable to you but without feeling that you have ‘won’! If you succeed, little by little in wearing away the old habit, you can ask him to reflect on the stress that he is missing!

Despite the inevitable conflict that such parent-son exchanges entail, I believe that it is essential for us to have the determination to address procrastination, as it is a habit that can become seriously disabling if nothing important ever gets done. Some psychologists equate this self-defeating behaviour to an addiction where procrastination has become one’s ‘drug of choice’. Just as we remove alcohol, or drugs from an addict and limit screen time to prevent our teenager from becoming a virtual reality zombie, we have to reduce and ultimately to eliminate the time he is wasting through procrastination if he is to achieve his potential.