Howell & Watson (2007): Achievement Goals and Learning Strategies
Howell and Watson surveyed 170 undergraduates on procrastination, achievement goal orientation and how they actually study. Procrastination was lower in students with mastery-approach goals, wanting to understand and improve, and higher in those with mastery-avoidance goals, wanting to avoid failing to understand. The stronger findings were about method rather than motive: procrastination was most closely predicted by disorganisation and by weaker use of cognitive and metacognitive learning strategies. That reframes chronic academic delay as partly a skills gap, which is more encouraging than a character explanation.
| Citation | Howell, A. J., & Watson, D. C. (2007). Procrastination: Associations with achievement goal orientation and learning strategies. Personality and Individual Differences, 43(1), 167–178. |
|---|---|
| Study type | Cross-sectional questionnaire study with correlational and multiple regression analyses |
| Sample | 170 undergraduate students |
| Key finding | Procrastination correlated negatively with mastery-approach goals and positively with mastery-avoidance goals; disorganisation and low use of cognitive strategies were the strongest predictors in regression |
What the study found
Students completed measures of procrastination, achievement goal orientation and self-regulated learning strategies. At the correlational level, procrastination was associated negatively with a mastery-approach orientation and positively with a mastery-avoidance orientation, the stance of working mainly to avoid failing to master something. When all variables were entered together, the goal orientation measures were not the strongest predictors. Disorganisation and low use of cognitive learning strategies, things like rehearsal, elaboration and organising material, accounted for most of the predictive power, with metacognitive self-regulation also implicated.
Why it matters
Most popular explanations of student procrastination are about wanting it enough. This study points somewhere more practical: students who delay tend to lack a working method for approaching study, so every session begins with an unresolved question about what to actually do, which is a reliable place for delay to enter. It also gives interventions a target. Teaching planning, breaking work into defined steps and monitoring your own understanding is trainable in a way that motivation is not, and the mastery-avoidance finding suggests a second lever, shifting the framing of study from avoiding failure to building competence.
Caveats
This is a single cross-sectional sample of undergraduates, so it shows association rather than causation, and the arrow could easily run the other way: chronic delay leaves no time to use good study strategies, which then looks like disorganisation. All measures are self-report, and students who describe themselves as procrastinators may also describe themselves as disorganised for reasons of self-perception rather than behaviour. Later work generally supports the link between poor self-regulated learning and academic delay, but the size of the effect and its direction over time are better tested by longitudinal studies than by this design.
Peer-reviewed study in Personality and Individual Differences, widely cited in academic procrastination research. Metadata verified via Crossref and Semantic Scholar.
Related
Procrastinating on coursework deadlinesSolomon & Rothblum on why students delayWeekly review, a fix for the disorganisation half
Frequently asked questions
Is procrastination a motivation problem or an organisation problem?
This study suggests organisation matters more than most people assume. Goal orientation was related to procrastination, but disorganisation and weak study strategies predicted it more strongly. In practice that means a student who knows exactly which three things to do next will usually start sooner than one who is simply told to care more.
What are mastery-approach and mastery-avoidance goals?
A mastery-approach goal is studying in order to understand and get better at something. A mastery-avoidance goal is studying mainly to avoid failing to understand, or to avoid losing ability you already have. The first was associated with less procrastination in this study, the second with more, which fits the wider finding that avoidance-shaped motives tend to produce delay.