Christa Grant

Date of Award

12-2009

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Teaching & Learning

Abstract

Procrastination is ubiquitous, encompasses many domains of life, i.e., school, work, and home, and for many people has negative results. Therefore, researchers, educators, psychologists, and counselors need to discover ways to alleviate the problem. When Gardner's multiple intelligences are used in pedagogical implementation in elementary and high schools, researchers have found positive results. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationships between procrastination and intrapersonal intelligence as well as the other dimensions of multiple intelligence among students in higher education in order to illuminate possible solutions to the problem of procrastination. Because intrapersonal intelligence is associated with the self, self-knowledge, self-understanding, self-monitoring, and self-correction, a relationship between procrastination and intrapersonal intelligence seemed likely.

This study surveyed 135 students from a small, southwestern university. Students were administered the Procrastination Assessment Scale-Students to determine procrastination reasons and levels, and the Multiple Intelligence Developmental Assessment Scale to determine levels of each multiple intelligence.

Descriptive statistics indicated that students procrastinate more on academic tasks than on administrative tasks. Results also revealed that college students usually procrastinate because they have task aversion, they feel overwhelmed, they have difficulty making decisions, and they are lazy. Although multiple regression results of all eight intelligences against procrastination indicated a significant relationship, stepwise forward calculations identified linguistic intelligence as the only significant predictor of procrastination. A MANOVA indicated that students with high intrapersonal intelligence are less likely to procrastinate on studying for exams than a student with low intrapersonal intelligence. In addition, a student with high intrapersonal intelligence is less likely to display overall procrastination than a student with low intrapersonal intelligence.

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