from the OK,-but-I'll-read-it-tomorrow dept.
Procrastination may harm your health. Here's what you can do:
The worst procrastinators probably won't be able to read this story. It'll remind them of what they're trying to avoid, psychologist Piers Steel says.
[...] In a study of thousands of university students, scientists linked procrastination to a panoply of poor outcomes, including depression, anxiety and even disabling arm pain. "I was surprised when I saw that one," says Fred Johansson, a clinical psychologist at Sophiahemmet University in Stockholm. His team reported the results January 4 in JAMA Network Open.
The study is one of the largest yet to tackle procrastination's ties to health. Its results echo findings from earlier studies that have gone largely ignored, says Fuschia Sirois, a behavioral scientist at Durham University in England, who was not involved with the new research.
For years, scientists didn't seem to view procrastination as something serious, she says. The new study could change that. "It's that kind of big splash that's ... going to get attention," Sirois says. "I'm hoping that it will raise awareness of the physical health consequences of procrastination."
It can be hard to tell if certain health problems make people more likely to procrastinate — or the other way around, Johansson says. (It may be a bit of both.) And controlled experiments on procrastination aren't easy to do: You can't just tell a study participant to become a procrastinator and wait and see if their health changes, he says.
In a new study, researchers have tied procrastination to a range of potential health issues and other negative outcomes, including:
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Stress
- Disabling arm pain
- Poor sleep quality
- Physical inactivity
- Loneliness
- Economic difficulties
[...] The study was observational, so the team can't say for sure that procrastination causes poor health. But results from other researchers also seem to point in this direction. A 2021 study tied procrastinating at bedtime to depression. And a 2015 study from Sirois' lab linked procrastinating to poor heart health.
Journal Reference:
Johansson F, Rozental A, Edlund K, et al. Associations Between Procrastination and Subsequent Health Outcomes Among University Students in Sweden. JAMA Netw Open. 2023;6(1):e2249346. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.49346
(Score: 4, Funny) by Opportunist on Thursday January 26 2023, @04:01PM (1 child)
Well, not right now, but soon, and that's final!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @04:36PM
-Scarlett, GWTW [quotes.net]
[ibid]
(Score: 2) by jonathan on Thursday January 26 2023, @04:11PM (1 child)
No sh** Sherlock.
Honestly, anyone with common sense would come to the same conclusion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @05:51PM
Yeah it's not so clear.
Let's look at the spectrum of motivation - there's procrastination at one end and ADHD hyperactivity at the other. The stupid professor points at one end only and says That's Bad(tm). And is probably also selling a book called Get Hypermotivated and Achieve All Your Dreams(tm). The truth is somewhere in the middle, and both end points are useful to have at your disposal depending on the situation.
So yeah, fuck you. Nobody is interested in hyperpositive self-punishment fantasy stories any more: Be Best, Yes You Can... sure, right after I smoke this blunt.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by ElizabethGreene on Thursday January 26 2023, @04:26PM (11 children)
Really? It only took me 6 years to ask the doctor about this rash on my hand.
In my defense, I was waiting to see if it cleared up on its own.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Freeman on Thursday January 26 2023, @04:39PM (10 children)
If a rash hasn't cleared up on its' own in a somewhat reasonable time period. It's not going to clear up. 6 years, is definitely procrastination. It will likely lead to them giving you a bill to tell you that you have dry skin or something equally stupid. Thanks, I'm glad we got that one cleared up! Not that they'll necessarily be able to help you clear it up. Still, it's always "best" to get your doctor's opinion. Certainly better than taking the word of a random person on the internet.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Informative) by RS3 on Thursday January 26 2023, @05:47PM (7 children)
I know people like to say that a lot, but does anyone really do that?
Maybe I'm wired differently, but I don't even take doctors' advice without some kind of thinking / evaluation process. Even doctors are human, and in medicine, gosh, there are so so many potential factors and treatments and side effects.
All that said, if there's a definitive test with a definitive result, and the treatment is pretty standard, it's a no-brainer and I'll do it.
For example, a few years ago I had a skin rash back of my knee. I'm susceptible to poison ivy, for example, and at first I thought that was what I had. It can take a week or more to clear up. It was quite minor, but slowly spread down my leg. After about 4 weeks, and when I noticed my ankle and foot just starting to swell, I self-diagnosed cellulitis and went to an urgent care. Dr. prescribed an antibiotic. I seem to have no allergies, so taking it was a no-brainer. But in chatting with Dr., I mentioned Lyme disease symptoms, so she changed the antibiotic to stronger doxycycline, which treats both Lyme and cellulitis and many things. Again, no-brainer. Lyme tests came back very positive, so I was on the right path in starting doxycycline. Both maladies cleared up immediately.
All that said, yes, 6 years is a long time. Not a Dr. (wish I had gone to med school though) but many things "resolve". Many treatments have many side effects. There are a huge number of things that can cause rash, including bacteria, viruses, fungus, allergies, but often it's a symptom of something else somewhere else. So doctors often wait and see if it "resolves", or if tests / test treatments are in order. And much of that depends on the patient, any other issues they have, any meds they may be on, any known allergies, etc.
A good friend of mine's mom, who was an RN and generally very strong, healthy, and health savvy, used to say "ignore it and it will go away". She lived to 101. She was a bit curmudgeonly, but usually in a humorous way. She would have lived much longer except for untreated UTI (that's a long story in itself). It turns out that UTI attacks the brain, nerves in general, and pretty much everything, so it's critical to catch and treat asap. And change whatever bad habits that are causing it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by acid andy on Thursday January 26 2023, @06:04PM (3 children)
They do if you substitute "random" for any trait that wins over the person's trust--and for many people that can be something staggeringly insignificant. People like attention. They like getting easy answers. They don't like to think critically especially when the end result makes their life a bit more difficult or unpleasant.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Thursday January 26 2023, @06:22PM (2 children)
I've never been one for salespersonship, but I get what you're saying. The human brain is a pattern-matching machine, so you make any kind of connection with the person and you easily reel them in. I can't do that to people, it just feels wrong.
I think my very strong curious nature dovetails with my strong natural and general skepticism. I may be naive, but rarely gullible. Kind of a "take everything with a grain of salt" basic nature.
Except for here, of course. System's BS filters are most efficient AI censors on earth! :)
I'm only half kidding; that day is coming to a website near you (already is happening of course...)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @07:18PM (1 child)
One day, when all is revealed, you will realize you weren't cynical enough - by a loooong way.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Thursday January 26 2023, @07:44PM
Oh, I am, I just play my cards close to my chest. :)
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday January 26 2023, @08:19PM (2 children)
The Tide Pod Challenge issue would not be an issue otherwise. Yes, there are stupid people on the internet. There are also naive people on the internet. The internet is a very wild west kind of place still and the naive tend to get fleeced or otherwise harmed.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @08:48PM (1 child)
I'm okay with things like Tide Pod Challenge. Referring to the Darwin Awards, it helps clean up the gene pool in more ways than one. :)
Really, to be fair, it was a "jackass" stunt fad / craze, not someone's attempt at medical advice. Don't commingle the two different things that only have the Internet as common connector.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Friday January 27 2023, @02:48PM
I'm just saying that there are plenty of naive people on the internet who may actually take medical advice from random strangers.
Here's some interesting bit of information, too:
"Google receives more than 1 billion health questions every day"
https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/healthcare-information-technology/google-receives-more-than-1-billion-health-questions-every-day.html [beckershospitalreview.com]
You're going to tell me that at least some of those people aren't getting their information from non-professionals?
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 3, Interesting) by krishnoid on Thursday January 26 2023, @06:44PM (1 child)
In my amateur opinion:
I think modern western medicine uses a rough two-week (maybe one week) observation window to see if a visible or experienced condition goes away. If it stays the same or worsens by the end of that period, that's usually when they start to worry that it's something the body can't take care of on its own. Longer-term trending is usually done via annual physical exam.
In the meantime they can do any diagnostic-only noninvasive tests they want, but I think they want to hold off on any treatment until they can tell it's not getting better on its own. It's also why if you notice something, you want to note when you started noticing symptoms, and let the doctor know that date when you come in, even if it's to the emergency room. Date/timestamped digital photos on a portable device are a real accelerator for this kind of diagnosis.
This is for most non-urgent conditions as well as the ones that insidiously change after a couple weeks but then start doing worse things inside your body. Consider COVID-19's mild initial symptoms, and I mean, this guy was fine [youtu.be] for a day (or maybe more), maybe a little hungrier than usual.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 28 2023, @04:05AM
> I think modern western medicine uses a rough two-week (maybe one week) observation window ...
This sounds about right, for most things. Here's a counter-example that happened to me last year--where longer history made all the difference.
I had a painful lower tooth and my second generation dentist (our family started with his father c.1975) sent me to an endodontist for a tricky root canal. At the endodontist they also had a mini-CAT scanner ("cone beam CT") for dental imaging and they ran me through it as part of the root canal.
After the root canal (expertly done) the endodontist then reviewed the 3D scan with me. He told me I should start thinking hard about a plan for treatment (extraction, bridgework/implant) of the next tooth over--it was badly infected by the root and the infection was dissolving jaw bone, making a pocket in that part of the bone. Got me pretty worried.
Visited my dentist shortly afterwords and he said it was nothing. He pointed out his advantage over the fancy 3D image was a history of x-rays of that part of my jaw, going back many years. Nothing had changed, the endodontist had made a faulty diagnosis based on one point in time. It seems that my jaw had a pocket in that area naturally and the "shadow" that looked like infected tissue had also been there for years.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Freeman on Thursday January 26 2023, @04:34PM (4 children)
I will stop procrastinating. I will exercise as much as I should. I will drink as much water as I should. I will get actual diet advice from a licensed professional and stick to it. I will even make sure to do the dishes every night!
Let's see here, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 very good things that everyone could easily do. Yeah, I mean, sure why not? I'll start tomorrow, which turns into next week, which turns into next month, which turns into a forgotten resolution. Then, a new year comes and people start saying, hey you have a new years' resolution? Sure I do. (Last Years' New Years Resolution.) Life is complicated, get over it. Some things will forever be procrastinated on or be forgotten. It's better that way. Sometimes that's the only way you can actually get anything done.
How much of "procrastination" is just someone avoiding X stressful thing? Perhaps all that stress and procrastination is a symptom of an actual problem? A lot of times that actual problem may be something we can't or won't do anything about. For X reason, whether good or bad.
P.S. I didn't actually make any New Years' Resolutions. They are dumb.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @06:01PM
The real trick is to make it so you want to do those things (or not, if you really don't). Doing the dishes is satisfying, plus it's for yourself, so that's easy: Done. Listening to some "professional" telling you a bunch of bullshit lifestyle advice in a manic tone of voice: Not so satisfying - skip.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Thursday January 26 2023, @07:02PM (2 children)
In the meantime, procrastinate while you're trying to walk briskly [discovermagazine.com]. A lot of research circa 2015 showed a number of uncorrelated health benefits from walking (in contrast to other exercises), and the walking will start doing its stuff while you're procrastinating on how to stop wasting the rest of your life. And by the time you figure that much out, you already have a head start on your health, a good habit, and your doctor can downprioritize some sedentary-linked causes when checking you for issues.
A tiny bit of prework by picking a few podcasts (or getting recommendations), then getting earbuds or bone-conduction headphones is enough. When it comes to eating healthier, one idea (from an actual dietitian-type) about adding rather than subtracting [soylentnews.org] in your meals tends to stick with me.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Thursday January 26 2023, @07:05PM
Stupid busted link on adding instead of subtracting [youtube.com] above.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Freeman on Thursday January 26 2023, @08:24PM
Or, you know, things like this: "John Cleese’s classic “silly walk” burns more calories than a normal gait"
https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/12/adopting-a-silly-walk-like-monty-pythons-mr-teabag-burns-more-calories/ [arstechnica.com]
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by legont on Thursday January 26 2023, @04:37PM (1 child)
Procrastination... how does it compare with delayed gratification? Health and success wise.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @07:20PM
Let's wait and see... ;0
(Score: 5, Funny) by DannyB on Thursday January 26 2023, @05:01PM
March is when procrastinators spend that week celebrating procrastination and all the benefits it brings to our lives. We don't always get around to it in the first week, so that is why all of March is allocated for the celebrations of that week.
March will be here soon. But don't wait. And don't put it off until later. Procrastinate right now!
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Thursday January 26 2023, @05:13PM (2 children)
By "procrastination", they evidently mean putting off something that has no chance of not being necessary. When the necessity is not certain, delay can be very useful. Avoid needless effort, allows for a change of circumstances, tests the resolve behind the supposed necessity, and gives time to think of alternatives.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @06:31PM
> Avoid needless effort
This for sure. So many things that seem urgent when they first appear, eventually go away with little or no action on my part.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @08:54PM
Given enough time, any problem will solve itself.
At forteriori, the heat death of the universe.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Thursday January 26 2023, @06:06PM (4 children)
Depression, stress and anxiety when you procrastinate only have one cause: you *know* you should be doing something and you fret. Worse: you know your boss / manager / teacher expects something from you and you're waiting for the dreadful question: "Hey man, how's it coming along?" And then you lie, and the lie makes you fret even more.
Here's the solution: don't lie. Tell your boss you're a procrastinator. Plain and honest. Tell them you always start late, but then you work at it all the better because you've had time to mull over the problem in your head subconsciously or not, you always make up for lost time and you always end up delivering on time or early.
Tell them you understand they'll be worried to not result from you for a worryingly long time, but if they're willing to acknowledge your unusual method and take the risk, they won't be disappointed.
I've always told it like it is to prospective employers and current employers. They all knew exactly what to expect from me. And I happily procrastinate with full knowledge that those who are waiting for my results know they'll see stuff happening late. It's very relaxing to tell the truth, because your brain is not constantly trying to handle the cognitive dissonance of lying.
You might wonder: aren't you hurting your chances of getting a job if you're brutally honest and admit to a recruiter that you're a serial procrastinator?
Well no, for two reasons:
- If they can't live with your way of doing things, either you'll end up sorry working in a way you don't like, or procrastinating in secret and lying about it, or they'll end up sorry to have hired you. So what's the point of getting hired by them to begin with?
- If you're brutally honest, well... honestly is valued by recruiters. In all my career, brutal honesty has always paid off handsomely.
So there ya go. That's my secret to successful procrastination: just admit it :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 26 2023, @07:28PM (2 children)
I think you misunderstand the "boss" role. For a certain (large) class of psychiatric disorders, the reward is to change you. Whatever untreated compulsion that drives them, must be passed onto you or else you're not doing it right. So if you don't look busy enough, their entire purpose in life is to make you look busy or at least stressed out.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Thursday January 26 2023, @08:33PM (1 child)
I've done the "boss" role, more than once, and was good at it. I think _you_ misunderstand it, or maybe you've only ever worked for bad bosses.
The "boss" job is extremely rarely to try and change people, rather to understand their strengths and weaknesess (and maybe help them develop) and then make best use of them. It is never ever to make them all into clones of you.
A good craftsman knows all the tools in the box, knows which tools are best for which job, knows which tools _can_ be used for (if need be, not the same as the best) which job, and which tools should be avoided for which job. A good manager knows the same about their people, and further IME, knows when they don't know (usually due to not knowing technical detail of the job) and who to delegate the decision to in that case.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 27 2023, @04:47AM
I don't think the grandparent AC was suggesting that the behavior they describe is applicable to all managers.
I have managerial duties, and I know I don't want the people working for me to be stressed out. I expect them to meet with me regularly to talk about their projects. I have more experience than the people who report to me, so these meetings are an opportunity for me to help them solve problems they encounter and to simplify their tasks. While I expect regular meetings, I otherwise let them manage their time and do what works best for them. I expect the work to get done on time, just as any manager should. I don't micromanage people, and it's counterproductive. My supervisor is the same way, in that he expects results but doesn't micromanage me.
I did two postdocs. My first mentor also shared the managerial style I described. The second mentor fit the grandparent AC's description. He was one of the most disorganized people I've ever met, and missed a number of meetings with me. He didn't keep track of any goals he set, so he was very erratic. When I presented results, he was always somewhat confrontational. Sometimes he had valid reasons for wanting to do something differently, despite his controversial tone. But there were a lot of times where he wanted to argue with me because he didn't understand the results, even though everything was completely correct. It became very clear to me that he wanted me to feel like I was struggling to cover up his lack of knowledge on the subject. My experience with him was not unique, so it isn't a reflection on my competency level. Despite wanting to create an atmosphere of superiority, he admitted that he hadn't worked with the software tools we were using, and eventually asked me to train him. He really had no clue what I was really doing with the software. I didn't learn a whole lot from that experience except how not to manage employees.
I interpret the AC's comment to mean that some supervisors share the toxic mentality of my second postdoc mentor. I notice they put quotes around "boss" to imply a negative connotation. I could see that the word "boss" implies something different from supervisor or manager. I don't really consider myself a manager. I'm someone who does a lot of technical work but also has some managerial duties. I wasn't hired to be a manager, but to do a technical work. I'd hate my job if I had little or no technical work and was just a manager. It's the difference between Captain Kirk and Admiral Kirk. :-)
(Score: 2) by Tork on Thursday January 26 2023, @08:26PM
I'm glad to hear some discussion on this. On too many occasions I've spent hours doing something the hard way only to come up with a much better/faster/easier way to accomplish the task as I veg in my recliner at night. One of the things I've done a few times is I've pulled aside someone on my team just before leaving on a Friday and told them, informally mind you, what their next task will be. The reason being they have the weekend to let the challenge roll around in their mind for a bit. I do want to be clear and emphasize that I don't mean I'm asking them to work on it over the weekend, just letting them know what's next. I've gotten some innovative responses that way before.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Saturday January 28 2023, @12:54PM
Ah, that's good, because then I don't have to worry about procrastinating by reading the story while I should actually do something different. :-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.