Photo Submitted by Dennis Hudson
In today’s society, college students find themselves investing their time in their cell phones, participating in activities and events with close friends, playing video games, watching Netflix, and the list goes on.
Spending so much time with other duties and activities while not keeping up with schoolwork in a timely manner — let’s call it what is, procrastinating — causes students stress on different levels.
“Usually when I’m procrastinating on schoolwork or homework, I’m either taking that time to get some rest, or to get other things done like cleaning my room or running to the store,” said Imani Wilson, a business administration student at FAMU.
No matter how well-organized and committed people may be, they may always find themselves wasting countless hours with things that are less important. Procrastination can have a major impact on your job, your grades and your life.
According to a recent study, an estimated 25 to 75 percent of college students procrastinate on academic work. Students may overestimate how much time they have to get their work done, don’t know how motivated they will be in the future, underestimate how long it will take for them to complete their work and may also assume that they will be in the right state of mind when they do decide to start on their work.
“I procrastinate because I feel like I create better quality of work closer to the deadline. If I complete the assignment way ahead of time, odds are that I’m going to just throw something together to get it out of the way and then I’ll really sit down and edit it or complete it the right way before it’s due. If I wait until a couple of days before the assignment is due, I know I’m going to complete it to the best of my ability because I know I have limited time and one shot to get that good grade” said Wilson.
One big factor that contributes to procrastination is the conception that students must feel inspired or motivated enough in order to begin a task. Another factor might be self-doubt. If a student doesn’t know where to begin or doubts their abilities, they tend to put it off to the side in order to work on other assignments that they feel comfortable working on.
Procrastination can also have a serious impact on the mental and physical health of a student.
“It bothers me mentally and physically. Mentally because once I procrastinate, I start to stress about all of the work I have to get done and then I feel overwhelmed. Physically, it affects me because sometimes, I procrastinate to the point where I have to stay up until 2–3 a.m. trying to get my work done and I have classes at 8 a.m. so I lose a lot of sleep and be very tired” said Miracle Fitzpatrick, a pre-nursing student at FAMU.
There are many ways for students to stop procrastination. Some techniques include having the right attitude for getting started, breaking the assignments down into smaller tasks, or even putting aside the constant distractions in order to complete tasks. It’s possible to overcome the challenges of procrastination, if you put your mind to it.