拖延可能损害你的健康
Procrastination may harm your health
Avoidance is linked to poor outcomes, but change is possible
BY MEGHAN ROSEN
（Procrastination拖延症/proʊˌkræs.tɪˈneɪ.ʃən/）
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.
Maybe they’re dragging拖拉; 缓慢移动[dræɡ] their feet going to the gym. Maybe they haven’t gotten around to their New Year’s resolutions. Maybe they’re waiting just one more day to study for that test.
Procrastination is “putting off to later what you know you should be doing now,” even if you’ll be worse off, says Steel, of the University of Calgary in Canada. But all those tasks pushed to tomorrow seem to wedge把…楔住 [wedʒ] themselves into the mind—and it may be harming people’s health.
In a study of thousands of university students, scientists linked procrastination to some problems, 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 reports the results January 4 in JAMA Network Open.
The study is one of the largest yet to tackle 着手处理[ˈtækl] 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.
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,” says Sirois, who wasn’t involved in the research. “I’m hoping that it will raise awareness of the physical health consequences结果; 重要性[ˈkɒnsɪkwəns] of procrastination.”
Bad for mind and body
Whether procrastination harms health can seem like a chicken-and-egg situation. 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.
Many previous studies have relied on self-reported surveys taken at a single time point. But a snapshot of someone makes it tricky棘手的[ˈtrɪki] to untangle整顿; 解决[ˌʌnˈtæŋɡl] cause and effect. The researchers in the new study enrolled招收[ɪnˈrəʊl] about 3,500 students to follow over nine months, so the team could track whether procrastinating students later developed health issues.
On average, procrastinating students tended to fare进展[feə(r)] worse over time. Procrastinators were slightly more stressed, anxious, depressed and sleep-deprived, among other issues. “People who score higher on procrastination to begin with … are at greater risk of developing both physical and psychological problems later on,” says study coauthor Alexander Rozental, a clinical psychologist at Uppsala University in Sweden. “There is a relationship between procrastination at one time point and having these negative outcomes at the later point.”
The study was observational观察的[ˌɒbzəˈveɪʃənl], 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 putting off going to bed and staying up late to depression. And a 2015 study from Sirois’ lab linked procrastinating to poor heart health.
Stress may be to blame for procrastination’s ill effects, data from Sirois’ lab and other studies suggest. She thinks that the effects of chronic慢性的，长期的[ˈkrɒnɪk] procrastinating could build up over time. And though procrastination alone may not cause disease, Sirois says, it could be “one extra factor that can tip the scales使占优势.”
A behavioral pattern
Some 20 percent of adults are estimated to be chronic procrastinators. Everyone might put off a task or two, but chronic procrastinators make it their lifestyle, says Joseph Ferrari, a psychologist at DePaul University in Chicago who has been studying procrastination for decades. “They do it at home, at school, at work and in their relationships.” These are the people, he says, who “you know are going to RSVP late.”
Though procrastinators may think they perform better under pressure, Ferrari has reported the opposite. They actually work more slowly and make more errors than non-procrastinators, his experiments have shown. When deadlines are slippery, procrastinators tend to let their work slide, Steel’s team reported last year in Frontiers in Psychology.
For years, researchers have focused on studying the personalities of people who procrastinate. Findings vary, but some scientists suggest procrastinators may be impulsive, be worriers and have trouble regulating their emotions. One thing procrastinators are not, Ferrari emphasizes, is lazy. They’re actually “very busy doing other things than what they’re supposed to be doing,” he says.
In fact, Rozental adds, most research today suggests procrastination is a behavioral pattern. And if procrastination is a behavior, he says, that means it’s something you can change.
End the dawdling
When people put off a tough task, they can feel good—in the moment.
Procrastinating is a way to sidestep the negative emotions linked to the task, Sirois says. “We’re sort of hardwired to avoid anything painful or difficult,” she says. “When you procrastinate, you get immediate relief.” A backdrop of stressful circumstances—say, a pandemic—can strain people’s ability to cope, making procrastinating even easier. But the relief it provides is only temporary.
Researchers have experimented with procrastination treatments that run the gamut from the practical to the psychological to help those who seek out ways to stop dawdling. What works best is still under investigation. Some scientists have reported success with time-management interventions. But the evidence for that “is all over the map,” Sirois says. “Poor time management is a symptom, not a cause of procrastination.”
For some procrastinators, seemingly obvious tips can work. In his clinical practice, Rozental advises students to simply put down their smartphones. Silencing notifications or studying in the library rather than at home can quash distractions and keep people on task. But that won’t be enough for many people, he says.
Hard-core procrastinators may benefit from cognitive behavioral therapy. In a 2018 review of procrastination treatments, Rozental found that this type of therapy, which involves managing thoughts and emotions and trying to change behavior, seemed to be the most helpful. Still, not many studies have examined treatments, and there’s room for improvement, he says.
Sirois also favors an emotion-centered approach. Procrastinators can fall into a shame spiral where they feel uneasy about a task, put the task off, feel ashamed for putting it off and then feel even worse than when they started. People need to short-circuit that loop, she says. Selfforgiveness may help, scientists suggested in one 2020 study.
Practicing mindfulness also could be effective. In a small trial of university students, eight weekly mindfulness sessions reduced procrastination, Sirois and colleagues report in the January Learning and Individual Differences. Students practiced focusing on the body, meditating during unpleasant activities, and discussed the best way to take care of themselves.
A little self-compassion may snap people out of their spiral, Sirois says. “You made a mistake and procrastinated. It’s not the end of the world,” she says. “What can you do to move forward?”
(此文章来自于Science News 2023年第4期的杂志)
附
拖延可能会损害您的健康
回避与不良结果有关，但改变是可能的
作者：梅根·罗森
最糟糕的拖延者可能无法阅读这个故事。它会提醒他们他们试图避免什么，心理学家皮尔斯·斯蒂尔说。
也许他们拖着脚去健身房。也许他们还没有实现他们的新年决心。也许他们只是再等一天来学习那个测试。
拖延是“把你知道你现在应该做的事情推迟到以后”，即使你会变得更糟，加拿大卡尔加里大学的斯蒂尔说。但所有这些推到明天的任务似乎都楔入了人们的脑海，这可能会损害人们的健康。
在一项针对数千名大学生的研究中，科学家们将拖延与一系列不良结果联系起来，包括抑郁、焦虑甚至致残的手臂疼痛。“当我看到那个时，我很惊讶，”斯德哥尔摩索菲亚海姆特大学的临床心理学家弗雷德约翰逊说。他的团队于1月4日在JAMA网络公开赛上报告了结果。
这项研究是迄今为止解决拖延症与健康关系的最大研究之一。它的结果与早期研究的结果相呼应，这些研究结果在很大程度上被忽视了，英国杜伦大学的行为科学家Fuschia Sirois说。
她说，多年来，科学家们似乎并不认为拖延是一件严重的事情。这项新研究可能会改变这一点。“就是那种大水花…会引起注意，“没有参与研究的Sirois说。“我希望它能提高人们对拖延症对身体健康后果的认识。
对身心有害
拖延是否损害健康似乎是一个先有鸡还是先有蛋的情况。约翰逊说，很难判断某些健康问题是否使人们更有可能拖延，或者相反。（可能两者兼而有之。他说，关于拖延症的对照实验并不容易做到：你不能只是告诉研究参与者成为一个拖延者，然后等待，看看他们的健康状况是否会发生变化。
以前的许多研究都依赖于在单个时间点进行的自我报告调查。但是一个人的快照使得解开因果关系变得棘手。这项新研究的研究人员招募了大约3，500名学生，随访了九个月，因此该团队可以跟踪拖延学生后来是否出现了健康问题。
平均而言，拖延的学生随着时间的推移往往比他们的提示同龄人表现得更糟糕。拖延者的压力、焦虑、抑郁和睡眠不足等问题略微增加。“那些在拖延症中得分较高的人一开始……以后出现身体和心理问题的风险更大，“该研究的共同作者，瑞典乌普萨拉大学的临床心理学家Alexander Rozental说。“一个时间点的拖延和后来的这些负面结果之间存在关系。
这项研究是观察性的，所以研究小组不能肯定地说拖延会导致健康状况不佳。但其他研究人员的结果似乎也指向了这个方向。2021 年的一项研究将推迟睡觉和熬夜与抑郁症联系起来。Sirois实验室2015年的一项研究将拖延与心脏健康状况不佳联系起来。
压力可能是拖延症的不良影响的罪魁祸首，Sirois实验室和其他研究的数据显示。她认为慢性拖延的影响会随着时间的推移而累积。Sirois说，虽然拖延本身可能不会引起疾病，但它可能是“一个可以扭转天平的额外因素”。
行为模式
据估计，大约20%的成年人是慢性拖延症患者。每个人都可能会推迟一两个任务，但长期拖延者会把它作为他们的生活方式，芝加哥德保罗大学的心理专家约瑟夫·法拉利（Joseph Ferrari）说，他几十年来一直在研究拖延症。“他们在家里、学校、工作和人际关系中都这样做。他说，这些人“你知道会迟到”。尽管拖延者可能认为自己在压力下表现得更好，但法拉利却报告了相反的情况。他的经验表明，他们实际上比非拖延者工作得更慢，犯的错误也更多。当截止日期很滑时，拖延者往往会让他们的工作下滑，斯蒂尔的团队去年在《心理学前沿》（Frontiers in Psychology）上报道。多年来，研究人员一直专注于研究拖延症患者的个性。研究结果各不相同，但一些科学家认为拖延者可能是冲动的，更担心的，并且难以调节自己的情绪。法拉利强调，职业狂热者不具备的一件事是懒惰。他们实际上“非常忙于做其他事情，而不是他们应该做的事情，”他说。事实上，Rozental补充说，今天的大多数研究表明，拖延是一种行为模式。他说，如果拖延是一种行为，那就意味着你可以改变它。结束徘徊 当人们推迟一项艰巨的任务时，他们会在当下感觉良好。拖延是一种回避与任务相关的负面情绪的方法，Sirois说。“我们天生就要避免任何痛苦或困难的事情，”她说。“当你拖延时，你会立即得到缓解。压力大的背景——比如大流行——会使人们的应对能力紧张，使拖延变得更加容易。但它提供的救济只是暂时的。
研究人员已经尝试了从实际到心理的拖延治疗，以帮助那些寻求停止发呆的方法的人。最有效的方法仍在调查中。一些科学家报告说，时间管理干预取得了成功。但证据“遍布地图，”Sirois说。“时间管理不善是一种症状，而不是拖延的原因。对于一些拖延症患者来说，看似显而易见的技巧可以奏效。在他的临床实践中，Rozental建议学生简单地放下智能手机。静音通知或在图书馆而不是在家学习可以消除干扰并让人们专注于任务。但对于许多人来说，这还不够，他说。核心拖延者可能受益于认知行为疗法。在2018年对拖延治疗心理的回顾中，Rozental发现这种类型的疗法，包括管理思想和情绪，并试图改变行为，似乎是最有帮助的。尽管如此，没有多少研究检查了非独立治疗，而且还有改进的余地，他说。Sirois也喜欢以情感为中心的方法。拖延者可能会陷入羞耻的漩涡，他们对一项任务感到不安，推迟任务，为推迟任务而感到羞耻，然后感觉比开始时更糟。人们需要缩短这个循环，她说。科学家在2020年的一项研究中建议，自我宽恕可能会有所帮助。练习正念也可能是有效的。在一项针对大学生的小型试验中，每周八次正念减少了拖延，Sirois及其同事在一月份的学习和个体差异中报告。Students练习专注于身体，在不愉快的活动中冥想，并讨论照顾自己的最佳方法。一点点的自我同情可能会把人们从他们的螺旋中解脱出来，Sirois说。“你犯了一个错误，拖延了。这不是世界末日，“她说。“你能做些什么来前进？”