136. The psychology of procrastination

In our 20s, we’re all vulnerable to feeling that we’re falling behind. Whether it be chasing the perfect job, relationship, friends, living situation, trip abroad, or something else, we’re led to believe that there’s a certain window of time that we should be achieving certain mi ...  Show more

The Stanford Prison Experiment is one of the most famous studies in psychology, but also one of the most controversial. In this bonus episode, we look at what actually happened in the basement of Stanford University in 1971. We explore: The landscape of psychological research at ...  Show more

We all put things off sometimes — even when we know there will be negative consequences for doing it. Whether we avoid doing household chores, making appointments, or paying our bills, procrastination can become a real problem. And while some people seem to think it’s a time mana ...  Show more

We all do it. That task you’ve been avoiding? Still there. That thing you told yourself you’d start tomorrow? Welcome to tomorrow. We like to think procrastination is just laziness, but it’s usually something deeper. A hidden fear, a mental block, or maybe just a really well-orga ...  Show more

#162: Procrastination is something of a mystery. Its costs — decreased quality of work, fraying of bonds with others, increased negative emotions like stress, even health effects — are universally acknowledged. Yet procrastination persists — or, put precisely, people persist i ...

Sometimes when we procrastinate on one thing, it seems to prevent us from doing anything at all - at least anything we think we should be doing. This week, I share a listener's story about how the most detrimental effect of his tendency to procrastinate is that it makes him put e ...  Show more