Category: Difficulty Paper

In this article we get different views on procrastination. How it happens to students and even people who work, every human goes through procrastination. It provides us with different experiments done on humans that explain procrastination. In this reading I relate to “when we put off preparing for that meeting by telling ourselves that we’ll do it tomorrow, we fail to take into account that tomorrow the temptation to put off work will be just as strong.” A lot of the time not only procrastinating Homework I procrastinate the time I have to study for a test which ends up procrastinating every day leading up to the exam, like procrastination doesn’t get better by the time you spend putting off the work it tends to get worse. I agree with the saying “The vaguer the task, or the more abstract the thinking it requires, the less likely you are to finish it.” I agree with this because the more difficult the task it builds a fear of the unknown like the grade you would get the way you will perform on the task and it gets mentally draining. This article shows that even the most punctual people procrastinate; it is almost like every human goes through this. I tend to procrastinate a lot when I have a deadline. I always go on the fact that “I have more time” “is due next week” and I end up doing almost everything last minute. “The key, for Ross, is that although the television-watching self is interested only in watching TV, it’s interested in watching TV not just now but also in the future.”  Reading into this sentence in ten reading the author’s choice on how to describe this was confusing. I was overthinking the meaning of the sentence and it took a while to get what the author meant. 

In the article “Later” by James Surowiecki a quote I found relatable is “I woke up and decided that the next morning would be the day to send the Stiglitz box.” He was always about to send the box, but the moment to act never arrived.” I find this relatable because I tend to have to something but always get side tracked by something else. I don’t think I mean to get side tracked but I find something more enjoyable to do then task I’m supposed to.  I think the article gives a very brief explanation on what different philosophers see is the reason for procrastination is. They all have the similar mindset of saying that us as humans always try to go for short run rather then long run because we’re ignorant. I agree and disagree with this social scientist Job Elster when he says this in the article “ people underestimate the time it will take them to complete a given task, so partly because they fail to take account of how long it has taken them to complete similar projects in the past.” I disagree upon the sentence because in terms of college might I say we don’t mind how long the tasks takes to be done we base on the fact if we want to do it.  The tasks could be a 800 word essay or 15 page essay as a college student reading that for an assignment I would consider not how long it would take me to do it ,it’s just not what I’m gonna do at that time.  But if I do admit I did find this article very interesting and very helpful knowing the reasons for my procrastination. And the history of it as well because I never knew procrastination was known in the 16th century very informative.