Relationship Between Procrastination and

Academic Performance Among a Group of

Undergraduate Dental Students in India
Nagesh Lakshminarayan, M.D.S.; Shrudha Potdar, B.D.S.; Siddana Goud Reddy, M.D.S.
Abstract: Procrastination, generally defined as a voluntary, irrational delay of behavior, is a prevalent phenomenon among college
students throughout the world and occurs at alarmingly high rates. For this study, a survey was conducted of 209 second-, third-,
and fourth-year undergraduate dental students of Bapuji Dental College and Hospital, Davangere, India, to identify the relationship between their level of procrastination and academic performance. A sixteen-item questionnaire was used to assess the level
of procrastination among these students. Data related to their academic performance were also collected. Spearmans correlation
coefficient test was used to assess the relationship between procrastination and academic performance. It showed a negative correlation of -0.63 with a significance level of p<0.01 (two-tailed test), indicating that students who showed high procrastination
scores performed below average in their academics. In addition, analysis with the Mann-Whitney U test found a significant difference in procrastination scores between the two gender groups (p<0.05). Hence, among the Indian undergraduate dental students
evaluated in this study, it appeared that individuals with above average and average academic performance had lower scores of
procrastination and vice versa.
Dr. Lakshminarayan is Professor and Head, Department of Public Health Dentistry, Bapuji Dental College and Hospital, Davangere, Karnataka, India; Dr. Potdar is a postgraduate student, Department of Public Health Dentistry, Bapuji Dental College and
Hospital, Davangere, Karnataka, India; and Dr. Reddy is a Reader, Department of Public Health Dentistry, RKDF Dental College
and Research Centre, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India. Direct correspondence and requests for reprints to Dr. Shrudha Potdar, Department of Public Health Dentistry, Bapuji Dental College and Hospital, Davangere, Karnataka, India; drshrudha@gmail.com.
Keywords: procrastination, academic performance, dental students, India
Submitted for publication 12/2/11; accepted 6/7/12

he term procrastination has been defined

as the act of needlessly delaying tasks to the
point of experiencing subjective discomfort
or putting off that which is necessary to reach some
goal.1 Procrastination is a current topic of interest
across multiple fields, from finance (as people defer
dealing with their financial troubles) to health care (as
people delay seeing their physicians).2 Unfortunately,
it also has been associated with numerous negative
outcomes including neuroticism, depression, anxiety,
impulsivity, aversiveness, task delay, and low selfefficacy and conscientiousness, in addition to its
facets of self-control, distractability, organization,
achievement motivation, and poor academic performance.3 Hence, such negative outcomes are believed
to interfere with task performance. Postponing a task
frequently leads to a larger task and more serious
problems like stress, a sense of guilt and crisis, severe
loss of personal productivity, and social disapproval
for not meeting responsibilities or commitments.
When these feelings are combined, they may promote
further delays or procrastination. For example, when
people postpone a visit to the dentist or the reading
assignments for a college course, they often have
more severe dental problems or an all-night cram-

524

ming session later on, respectively. It is regarded as

normal for people to procrastinate to some degree,
but such procrastination becomes problematic when
it impedes normal functioning. In fact, Watkins has
stated that chronic procrastination may be a sign of
an underlying psychological disorder.4
Research findings on the proportion of students
who procrastinate have not been consistent.5 Ellis
and Knaus6 found that the number of students who
procrastinate at some point approaches 95 percent,
while Solomon and Rothblum7 estimated that at least
half of all students consistently and problematically
procrastinate. It was also determined that procrastination is related not only to higher stress and poorer
coping strategies, but also to avoidance behaviors.8
Dental students are no exception because they frequently must balance their academic, preclinical,
and clinical responsibilities simultaneously. Lack
of time management can lead to procrastination of
academic and clinical tasks that ultimately could
impact their academic performance. With so many
scheduled activities on students schedules, they must
possess the skills needed to set goals, achieve those
goals, and, in the process, avoid procrastination.
According to Sujit et al., better time management

Journal of Dental Education Volume 77, Number 4

skills, precludes cramming for examinations at

the last minute and can result in diminished anxiety
and improved academic performance.9 It is very
important to identify such students and make them
aware of the negative impact of procrastination on
their academic performance.
Our study was conducted to identify the level
of procrastination among a group of undergraduate dental students in India and its relationship to
their academic performance. In addition, the study
sought to determine if any gender disparity regarding
procrastination existed among this population. The
null hypotheses tested were as follows: 1) there is
no relationship between the level of procrastination
and academic performance among these undergraduate Indian dental students, and 2) there is no gender
disparity in the level of procrastination between men
and women in this study population.

Materials and Methods

The study was conducted using a questionnaire designed as a cross-sectional survey. The study
participants were volunteers enrolled in the second-,
third-, and fourth-year Bachelor of Dental Surgery
(B.D.S.) curriculum of Bapuji Dental College and
Hospital, Davangere, India. A total of 209 students
agreed to participate, and all the participants signed
a written informed consent form. Ethical clearance
was obtained from the Institutional Review Board of
Bapuji Dental College and Hospital.
A sixteen-question, prevalidated questionnaire
was used to assess the level of procrastination.10 Data
also were collected to assess the participants academic
performance by comparison with their grades in the
previous university examination. A pilot study was
conducted among fifteen dental students to evaluate
the questionnaire. The resulting reliability coefficient
was r=0.66 at p<0.01. Cronbachs =0.79 and the
Wilcoxon signed-rank test were not found to be significant at 0.69, suggesting no significant variability.
The questionnaire was subsequently administered to 209 undergraduate dental students (fortysix female and fifteen male second-year students,
fifty-seven female and twenty-five male third-year
students, and forty-five female and twenty-one male
fourth-year students) by the investigators. Study participants ranged in age from nineteen to twenty-five
years with a mean age of twenty years.
The range of procrastination scores obtained
from the students was divided into three groups.

April 2013 Journal of Dental Education

Group 1 included those students in the 33.3 percentile or lower range, who were considered to have low
procrastination scores. Group 2 consisted of students
in the 33.4 percentile to 66.6 percentile, and they
were considered moderate procrastinators. Students
in Group 3 were those in the 66.7 percentile, and
they were considered to have a high procrastination
score. This same methodology was employed for
dividing academic performance on the previous
university examination into below average (Group
1), average (Group 2), and above average (Group
3). Using these classification criteria, the assigned
scores for procrastination were interpreted as follows:
16-36 for low procrastination (Group 1), 37-41 for
moderate procrastination (Group 2), and 42-64 for
high procrastination (Group 3). When classifying
academic performance, scores of 60% were interpreted as below average, scores of 61-68% equaled
average, and scores of 69% were considered to be
above average.
The students were instructed not to disclose
their names in the questionnaires. Untraceable code
names were assigned to the subjects throughout
the study, and anonymity was maintained. All the
participants were administered the questionnaire in
a classroom under a normal examination situation.
Interaction among the participants was minimized
to prevent any distortion of the results. If difficulties
in understanding any questions were encountered,
the investigators explained the questions in simple
terms. The completed questionnaires were collected
from all the participants, and the raw data obtained
were classified, tabulated, and subjected to statistical
analysis using SPSS version 11.5. The chi-square test
and Spearmans rank order correlation coefficient
test were used to assess the relationship between
procrastination and academic performance. The
Mann-Whitney U test was applied to test whether the
difference in procrastination scores between the two
genders was statistically significant. Multinomial logistic regression was applied to check the interaction
effect of other variables on the relationship between
procrastination and academic performance.

Results
Students who were considered high procrastinators performed below average in their academics,
whereas low procrastinators scored average or above
average in their academic performance (p<0.001,
Table 1). The results of the Spearmans correlation

525

Table 1. Relationship between level of procrastination and academic performance, by number and percentage of total
respondents

Procrastination Score

Academic Performance
Below average
Average
Above average
Total

Low

Moderate

High

Total

1 (1.9%)
27 (12.9%)
46 (20.6%)
74 (35.4%)

15 (12.9%)
26 (12.4%)
27 (7.2%)
68 (32.5%)

14 (21.5%)
21 (10.0%)
32 (0.5%)
67 (32.1%)

30 (36.4%)
74 (35.4%)
105 (28.2%)
209 (100%)

df=4, chi-square=78.968, p<0.001

coefficient test showed negative correlation between

procrastination score and academic performance
with r=-0.63, with a significance level of p<0.01
(two-tailed test) indicating that students with high
procrastination scores performed below average in
their academics.
The coefficient of determination (r2=0.39) with
significance at the p<0.01 level (two-tailed test)
indicated that procrastination alone contributed to
nearly 39 percent of the academic performance outcomes, suggesting the prime role of procrastination
behavior in the performance of students. Numbers
of students with differences in procrastination levels
and academic performance across the three years of
study are shown in Table 2. The relationship between
academic performance and procrastination was found
to be significant across all three years (p<0.001). The
Mann-Whitney U test showed a significant difference
in the procrastination scores between the two gender
groups (p<0.05). Male participants (42.6 percent)

were found to have higher procrastination scores than

the female participants (27.7 percent).
A summary of the regression analysis predicting academic performance using metrics such as age,
gender, procrastination, and year of study appears in
Table 3. When above average academic performance
was kept as a reference category, procrastination was
significantly associated with both below average and
average academic performance (p<0.001). Age was
also significantly associated with average academic
performance (p<0.002). However, this association
was not consistent in different age groups on age
stratification.

Discussion
In our study, second-, third-, and fourth-year
dental students were chosen because their academic
performance could be measured using university
grades previously obtained. The scale used to classify

Table 2. Relationship between level of procrastination and academic performance across three years of study, by number and percentage of total respondents

Procrastination Score

Academic Performance

526

Low

Moderate

High

Total

Second-year B.D.S

Below average
Average
Above average
Total

0
9 (14.7%)
14 (22.9%)
23 (37.7%)

11 (18.0%)
6 (9.8%)
1 (1.6%)
18 (29.5%)

16 (26.2%)
4 (6.5%)
0
20 (32.7%)

27 (44.2%)
19 (31.1%)
15 (24.5%)
61 (100%)

df=4
2=38.2
p<0.001

Third-year B.D.S

Below average
Average
Above average
Total

1 (1.2%)
12 (14.6%)
19 (23.1%)
32 (39.0%)

10 (12.1%)
14 (17.0%)
8 (9.7%)
32 (39.0%)

3 (3.65%)
14 (17.0%)
1 (1.2%)
18 (21.9%)

14 (17.0%)
40 (48.7%)
28 (34.1%)
82 (100%)

df=4
2=22.5
p<0.001

Final-year B.D.S

Below average
Average
Above average
Total

3 (4.5%)
6 (9.0%)
10 (15.1%)
19 (28.7%)

6 (9.0%)
6 (9.0%)
6 (9.0%)
18 (27.2%)

26 (39.3%)
3 (4.5%)
0
29 (43.9%)

35 (53.0%)
15 (22.7%)
16 (24.2%)
66 (100%)

df=4
2=31.1
p<0.001

Journal of Dental Education Volume 77, Number 4

Table 3. Summary of regression analysis predicting academic performance from age, gender, procrastination, and year
of study
Academic Performance

Independent Variable

p-value

Odds Ratio (CI)

Below average

Age
Gender
Procrastination
Year of study

0.7
0.3
0.001*
0.4

1.1 (0.7-1.6)
1.7 (0.6-4.8)
14.3 (7.0-29.3)
1.3 (0.6-2.6)

Average

Age
Gender
Procrastination
Year of study

0.002*
0.6
0.001*
0.31

0.5 (0.3-0.7)
1.2 (0.5-2.9)
4.3 (2.3-8.1)
0.7 (0.4-1.4)

Note: The reference category (Academic Performance) is above average.

*p<0.05 is significant, CI=confidence interval

academic performance of students as below average

(60 percent), average (61-68 percent), and above
average (69 percent) is applicable and relevant only
in India, so it would need to be revised for the other
countries depending on the local standards.
The first null hypothesis was that there was
no relationship between the level of procrastination
and academic performance among second-, third-,
and fourth-year undergraduate dental students of
Bapuji Dental College and Hospital. This hypothesis was rejected: a significant negative correlation
was found between procrastination and academic
performance among these students. These findings
of a negative correlation between procrastination
and academic performance are in agreement with
a study conducted among university mathematics
undergraduate students.11 The results of our study
also are consistent with other studies that found
procrastination was associated with below average
academic achievement.12-14 The reason for below
average academic performance among students who
procrastinate might be attributed to their low level
of self-esteem and self-efficacy.15 However, others
have reported that procrastinators performance is as
sound as non-procrastinators on course exams and
grades.1,7,13 Although procrastination affects virtually
everyone to some degree, academic procrastination
among college students is omnipresent, at levels
perhaps as high as 95 percent.6 One study found that
the correlation between procrastination behavior and
low academic achievement was higher where lessons
involve a great number of assignments.16 Academic
success could be attributed to skills such as organization of time with execution of duties on schedule,
determination of aims, prioritization of tasks, and
creating a pattern of studying systematically. In conApril 2013 Journal of Dental Education

trast, eleventh-hour intense study under pressure and

at late hours may trigger insomnia, inducing higher
levels of stress that may reduce ones ability to focus
on the subject matter and result in below average
academic performance.
The second null hypothesis was that there
would be no difference in procrastination scores between male and female participants in the study. This
null hypothesis also was rejected because a higher
percentage of males had high procrastination scores
than females. Several studies have emphasized that
procrastination behavior does not vary according to
gender, which is not consistent with the results of
our study.17-19 However, our study population was
not equally distributed between male and female
participants, so the gender difference found may
be due to the unequal sample sizes, which could be
a limitation of this study. Consequently, additional
studies with an equal distribution of men and women
are needed to determine if procrastination differs
between males and females.
By measuring, classifying, and evaluating the
prevalence of academic procrastination, the reasons
undergraduate dental students in India procrastinate
may be determined, and strategies could be developed to counter such negative behavior. Students
could be educated in organized team efforts about
efficient time management and how to improve
their organizational skills in order to reduce their
tendency to procrastinate. Additional studies are
needed to assess the influence of personnel and
environmental factors on procrastination, which is
known to be multifaceted in nature. As our study was
conducted among students of a single dental college,
extrapolation of outcomes to a wider population
demands studies encompassing a far greater number

527

of dental students from several institutions across

India. Furthermore, administering questionnaires on
procrastination to dental students at the onset of their
dental school training would facilitate identification
of potential procrastinators. Given that a high level
of procrastination has been found to correlate with
below average academic performance, motivational
programs could be introduced to assist and guide
these students. Ultimately, such measures may help
to improve the quality of dental education.

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Dr. C.S. Bhagyajyothi for her expert assistance in our statistical
analysis and all the dental students who participated
in this study.

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Journal of Dental Education Volume 77, Number 4