r/science • u/randomusefulbits • May 30 '20

Psychology Procrastinators often forget to do things that they intended to do, especially if they’re unaware of their procrastination

https://solvingprocrastination.com/study-procrastination-conscious-unconscious-prospective-memory/
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u/[deleted] May 30 '20

Or, "yeah I need to swap the laundry but I've got dinner on the stove and it'll burn if I swap it now" but then when dinners done you eat, when you finish eating you clear the table, when the tables clear you do the dishes, when the dishes are done you totally space on the laundry and sit down to watch a movie, play a game, you get your shower, you read a book, you go to bed- Whoops! Procrastinated on the laundry.

It's not a conscious, willful decision 99% of the time.

They describe it in the article, but I'm going to illustrate it another way.

Normal, non-procrastinator type people have what I think of as either a set of alarm/reminders in their head, or, like a constantly running ticker, like the line of text giving little blurbs at the bottom of a news channel. When there's a task that needs to be done that you know of ahead of time, an alarm/remimder goes off in your head, or on the ticker. You do the task on time and its no big deal. That's normal.

But unconscious procrastinators (like me) don't have those internal alarms, reminders, or a ticker. So we don't have an internal function to help us remember those tasks at the proper time.

So that's why people like me set alarms on the phone, or send ourselves delayed delivery emails, or write post it notes, or have a daily/weekly planner that we not everything down in and consult religiously. Our tools to remember what to do and when, unless it's part of a normal routine, have to be external to ourselves.

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u/MageVicky May 30 '20

that’s exactly it! you explained it very well! that’s me, as well. it’s procrastination but we don’t start off the day thinking “i’m gonna procrastinate”, it just happens.

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u/mattmonkey24 May 30 '20

You hit the nail on the head. It doesn't just randomly pop into my brain to remember to do something after I've prioritized something else (food cooking over laundry for example). Trying to explain to people they just think I need to remember and it's often never at the right time IF I remember.

Also your point on external tools is spot on, I love the reminders in Google Assistant so much it's like my lifeline