“Putting off until tomorrow, what can be done today”, this is not always a good idea. Why this bad habit of procrastination? To answer this question, Mathias Pessiglione, researcher at Inserm, and Raphaël Le Bouc, neurologist at the Brain Institute, called on 51 volunteers. They made them pass tests, including that of filling out tedious administrative forms to obtain money. Result: not only were there delays in sending the forms – proof that there were many procrastinators in the group – but, in addition, these researchers were able to spot them in advance.
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The questionnaires completed by the participants made it possible to identify those who preferred to make an effort immediately and be rewarded quickly and those who preferred to make an effort later and be rewarded later.
For example, some prefer to do the dishes after a dinner to enjoy a tidy kitchen the same evening, when others prefer to postpone the task until the next day. From the questionnaires, these researchers were even able to put these time preferences for reward and effort into a mathematical equation. This is how they were able to identify procrastinators in advance. Using medical imaging, they were also able to see where in the brain all these arbitrations take place: in the anterior cingulate cortex.
The peculiarity of the brain of a procrastinator is that it counts more quickly, over time, the costs of the effort compared to the rewards. In other words, they tend to think automatically, and without objective reason, that an effort will necessarily be easier afterwards. At the same level of fatigue, filing a tax return requires the same effort, regardless of the day chosen to do so. A procrastinator will always feel like the task will take less effort the next day.
At this stage, the study does not say how one could modify this cognitive bias. Nor does it say what comes under motivation and, therefore, psychology. But, in the future, knowing more about these mechanisms should help procrastinators develop strategies to get out of their bad habits.