Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Beating Procrastination with Self-Imposed Deadlines

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the post-now-or-later-now-or-later dept.

castironwok writes "Procrastination attracts us because of hyperbolic time discounting: the immediate (guilty) rewards are disproportionally more compelling than the greater delayed cost. Procrastination is the reward itself. An MIT professor found that when he allowed his students to give themselves their own homework deadlines, they would artificially restrict themselves to counter procrastination. However, they did not set deadlines for optimal effectiveness. I am personally a huge procrastinator and it's always a pull between rational logic (giving yourself the most time by choosing end dates as the deadline), and your past experience saying you will put it off so force yourself to start early."

11 of 213 comments (clear)

  1. Hey! by SeanMon · · Score: 5, Funny

    I was gonna post this yesterday, but...

    Nevermind.

    --
    "Scud Storm!" -- Jeremy of PurePwnage.com
  2. I live one calendar week ahead by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Forces me into finishing up early. I can't watch TV or listen to the radio and sometimes it is a little odd like when I showed up for last week's Christmas celebrations, but I'm making the deadlines.

    P.S. Happy New Year!

  3. Hard work often pays off after time.... by Namlak · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...but laziness always pays off now. http://www.despair.com/proc24x30pri.html

  4. I should be programming right now.... by Pikoro · · Score: 4, Funny

    But instead, i'm reading an article on slashdot about procrastination.

    Talk about the right story for the right job!

    --
    "Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
  5. Reasons for procrastination by Tzorcelan · · Score: 4, Funny

    Top ten reasons for procrastination: 1.

  6. Put best... by paintswithcolour · · Score: 5, Funny
    "I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they go by."

    --Douglas Adams

  7. Procrastination by I+don't+want+to+spen · · Score: 5, Funny

    Last post!

    --
    Don't go to a brothel if you want to buy broth
  8. Re:Procrastination makes me more efficient by Breakfast+Pants · · Score: 4, Funny

    It works for other things; I once put off a 15 page paper in an english class until the day before, the teacher had watched a documentary on MLK Jr. the night prior to this, and offered members of the class the opportunity to turn in a poem about MLK Jr. in place of the paper if they wanted. I turned in a haiku and got an A. This was at Yale.

    --

    --

    WHO ATE MY BREAKFAST PANTS?
  9. Re:Procrastination makes me more efficient by orangepeel · · Score: 5, Funny

    And now, having long since left Yale, you spend your days reading and posting to Slashdot ... under the name "Breakfast Pants".

    Oh yes, I can see clearly that procrastination hasn't hurt you at all.

    ;-)

    --
    Whoever designed level 61 in Frozen Bubble is a sadistic bastard.
  10. You Know how the Saying Goes by Slipgrid · · Score: 4, Funny
    As Writ on the bathroom stalls in Miami Universities CS Dept:

    Procrastination is like masturbation: it feels good until you realize you are fucking yourself.
  11. Re:Procrastination makes me more efficient by mattwarden · · Score: 5, Funny

    You laugh, but Breakfast Pants is the first person on Slashdot ever to use a semicolon correctly. If that's why people attend Yale, and I submit that it is, then Yale did its job.