4 Reasons We Procrastinate

The science and psychology of putting things off until tomorrow, next week, next year

Kim Painter

Updated April 16, 2025

A close-up view of a calendar with "Stop procrastinating" written on it

Ekaterina79/iStock

Everyone procrastinates sometimes. But not everyone is a chronic procrastinator — one of the estimated 20 percent of adults who routinely put off for tomorrow what they could do today, causing themselves and others constant frustration.

You procrastinators probably know who you are: You get gas only when the warning light comes on, buy milk only when the fridge is empty and pay a premium for plane tickets purchased at the last minute. You never file your taxes before April 15, or finish a project before the deadline.

But do you know why you do it?

If you think you were “born this way,” psychologists beg to differ. “Is it genetic? No, there’s no gene for it,” says Joseph Ferrari, professor of psychology at DePaul University in Chicago, and author of Still Procrastinating? The No-Regrets Guide to Getting It Done.

It’s also a misconception that procrastinators are lazy or have some character-related deficit, says psychologist Robert Schachter, an assistant clinical professor in the psychiatry department of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City.

Instead, Ferrari and Schachter say, procrastination is a learned behavior — one people adopt for a variety of reasons.

Reasons for putting it off

For some people, the experts say, procrastination arises from a treatable mental health condition, such as depression, anxiety or attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD.

People who are depressed typically lack energy and feel hopeless and helpless, all of which can lead to putting off demanding tasks, Schachter explains. And people with ADHD are plagued with distractions that get in the way of completing tasks, he says. Getting treatment for these issues can often be the first step to overcoming procrastination.

However, the list of potential underlying causes for procrastination is longer.

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Here are four of the most common:

1. Fear of success. The downside of success can be added responsibility, which scares some people, Ferrari says. They may think, “Now I might be held to a higher standard, and I don’t know if I can do this task again.”

2. Fear of failure. On the flip side, fear of failure “can paralyze you,” Schachter says. And this kind of fear is complex. Some people worry about loss of self-esteem, while others are concerned about disappointing others. “If I never finish, you can never judge me,” Ferrari says people say to themselves.

3. Delusions about deadline pressure. Many people convince themselves that they do their best work under pressure. But experiments show chronic procrastinators make more errors under time pressure than others do, Ferrari says.

4. Poor time perception. According to Ferrari, procrastinators often have a hard time estimating how much time a task will take. They’ll overestimate, making tasks seem too big to handle right away, or underestimate, which makes waiting seem reasonable.

Procrastinators may say that they are perfectionists — that they take their time because they want to do a great job. And there’s some truth that delaying some tasks to let ideas percolate can lead to better outcomes, such as when we ponder a problem and come upon the solution while taking a walk or a shower. But that’s not what procrastinators do. Instead, they avoid thinking about or acting on the task until the last minute. In many cases, Ferrari says, perfectionism is a face-saving excuse rather than a true cause of procrastination.

Ferrari and Schachter agree that one of the biggest myths about procrastination is that it can be cured by better time management alone — by using timers, calendars, lists or time logs.

Issues first, tools second

Some procrastinators might benefit from such tools, but only after they identify and tackle underlying issues. Once someone has dealt with their deadline delusions, poor time perception, fear of failure or other issues, Schachter says, “there’s a whole set of skills we can teach them.” For example, a person who has trouble starting a writing task might make a list of first steps, like: “I have to go into my office, sit down and turn on the computer.” Doing that and following through repeatedly builds “mastery and confidence,” he says.

Treatment strategies for procrastination are “based on a very small amount of research,” Ferrari concedes. But cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, during which patients work with therapists to systematically change the ways they think and behave, is a promising approach, he and Schachter say. A 2018 review in Frontiers in Psychology found a moderate benefit from such therapy, but called for more research.

“Someone needs to really be motivated to change procrastination because it can be very hard to do,” Schachter says.

But it’s not hopeless, Ferrari says: “It’s a learned behavior… it can be unlearned.”