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ABSTRACTPrecrastination is the act of completing a task as soon as possible even at the expense of extra effort. Past research has suggested that individuals precrastinate due to a desire to reduce their cognitive load, also known as the cognitive load-reduction (CLEAR) hypothesis [VonderHaar, R. L., McBride, D. M., & Rosenbaum, D. A. (2019). Task order choices in cognitive and perceptual-motor tasks: The cognitive-load-reduction (CLEAR) hypothesis. Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics, 81(7), 2517-2525. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13414-019-01754-z]. This idea stems from the notion that it is taxing to hold intentions in working memory and completing a task as soon as possible releases cognitive resources for other tasks. Based on this hypothesis, we predicted that aspects of executive function may play a role in precrastination. We tested this prediction using a box-moving task developed in a previous study to measure precrastination. We also incorporated tasks measuring updating and inhibition aspects of executive function: the Stroop interference (both experiments) and Simon tasks (Experiment 2) to measure inhibition and the 2-Back memory task (Experiment 1) to measure updating. We found that the majority of participants precrastinated significantly throughout the box-moving task trials, consistent with results from past studies. However, no relation was found between the executive function tasks and rates of precrastination. These results may be due to the automaticity of precrastination when cognitive resources are limited.

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Pre-crastination refers to the tendency to begin a task as soon as possible, even at the cost of additional effort. This phenomenon is consistently observed in tasks in which participants are asked to select one of two buckets to carry to a target. Surprisingly, on a high proportion of trials participants choose the bucket that is closer to them (and further from the target) as opposed to the bucket that is further from them (and closer to the target). In other words, participants tend to complete the task of picking up a bucket as soon as possible, even when this requires additional physical effort. The purpose of the current experiment was to test whether an individual's tendency to pre-crastinate is stable across tasks. Participants performed a physical load task where they selected one of two buckets to carry to a target. The same participants performed a cognitive load task where they picked up number strings at one of the two bucket locations and mentally carried the number string to a target. We found that participants pre-crastinated in both tasks and this tendency was reduced as task difficulty increased. Importantly, we found a significant association between an individual's tendency to pre-crastinate in the physical load task and their tendency to pre-crastinate in the cognitive load task. Thus, an individual's tendency to pre-crastinate is consistent across tasks and suggests that this is a stable characteristic of how individuals choose to order tasks.

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Although procrastination has been extensively studied, precrastination remains an unsolved puzzle. Precrastination is the tendency to start tasks as soon as possible, even at the cost of extra effort. Using the near bucket paradigm with 81 undergraduate students, this study examined the relationship between precrastination and time perspective, proactive personality, and subjects' differential performance in intertemporal decision-making. The results confirmed the cognitive-load-reduction (CLEAR) hypothesis. Precrastination was found to be positively predicted by the future time dimension of time perspective and negatively predicted by proactive personality. In addition, there is a significant positive correlation between precrastination and delay discounting of intertemporal decision-making, which exists only for the loss situation.

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A great deal of research has concerned choices of goods or services with different values receivable at various times. Temporal discounting - the magnification of values that can be obtained sooner rather than later - has proven to be immensely important in this regard. In the present article, we shift the focus from the receipt of goods or services to the performance of tasks. We show that temporal discounting also applies to task choices. Pre-crastination, the phenomenon we point to, was discovered by Rosenbaum, Gong, and Potts (2014) and is the tendency to hasten tasks even at the expense of extra energy. Pre-crastination was discovered in a study of psycho-motor performance, where the focus was on biomechanical factors affecting task choices. In the present article, we review that research, showing how the tendency found in the initial experiments are in fact illustrative of a more general motor-control tendency to inhibit easy forms of movement for the sake of later performance goals. Such inhibitory control may also be the basis for pre-crastination, provided one assumes that pre-crastination keeps working memory as clear as possible. A wide range of behavioral choices fit under the rubric of pre-crastination, such as answering emails too soon, submitting articles before they are ready, judging others before they should be judged, convicting others to get cases over with, and, in the worst case, going to war prematurely. Lack of temperance in these choices may seem to arise from impulsivity, but we argue against that view. The desire to "clear the decks" to be prepared for new challenges is, we suggest, a more apt account of pre-crastination.

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The traditional view of human procrastination is that engaging in an aversive task will be avoided until the anxiety associated with the consequences of missing the deadline exceeds the aversiveness of the task. Delay reduction theory suggests that there may be an additional mechanism, conditioned reinforcement associated with completion of the task close to the deadline. The results of several experiments support this hypothesis. First, we found support for the prediction of delay reduction theory that pigeons given equally long concurrent chains, prefer a chain involving a long fixed interval followed by a short fixed interval (followed by reinforcement) over a chain involving a short fixed interval followed by a long fixed interval (followed by reinforcement). In another experiment, to simulate a mildly aversive event, we added a dark gap between the two links in each of the chains and found the same result. Finally, consistent with delay reduction theory and with an analog of human procrastination, in a long box, we found that pigeons preferred to complete a response requirement on a panel closer to the goal (reinforcement) rather than closer to the start. The results of these experiments suggest that procrastination may be supported by conditioned reinforcement associated completion of a task close to the deadline.

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Standard approaches for identifying task-completion strategies, such as precrastination and procrastination, reduce behavior to single markers that oversimplify the process of task completion. To illustrate this point, we consider three task-completion strategies and introduce a new method to identify their use. This approach was tested using an archival data set (N = 8,655) of the available electronic records of research participation at Kansas State University. The approach outperformed standard diagnostic approaches and yielded an interesting finding: Several strategies were associated with negative outcomes. Specifically, both procrastinators and precrastinators struggled to finish tasks on time. Together, these findings underscore the importance of using holistic approaches to determine the relationship among task characteristics, individual differences, and task completion.

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Precrastination is the tendency many individuals have to complete a task as soon as possible in order to get it out of the way [Rosenbaum, D. A., Gong, L., & Potts, C. A. (2014). Pre-crastination: Hastening subgoal completion at the expense of extra physical effort. Psychological Science, 25(7), 1487-1496. doi:10.1177/0956797614532657]. The current study (N = 48) examined whether precrastination is affected by a concurrent memory load as predicted by the cognitive-load-reduction (CLEAR) hypothesis. Participants completed a bucket-carrying task under different memory-load conditions. In addition, the amount of physical effort was manipulated by changing the distance people needed to walk while carrying the weighted buckets. The tendency to precrastinate by picking up a near bucket and carrying it further than necessary was affected by the memory load. People were more likely to precrastinate when doing so resulted in the more rapid renewal of cognitive resources and were less likely to precrastinate when this required that the memory load be held for a longer period of time. These data are consistent with the position that precrastination is linked with working memory resources and occurs in an attempt to clear items from a mental to-do list.

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A core question in the study of the dynamics of cognition is how tasks are ordered. Given two tasks, neither of which is prerequisite for the other and neither of which brings a clearly greater reward, which task will be done first? Few studies have addressed this question, though recent work has suggested one possible answer, which we here call the cognitive-load-reduction (CLEAR) hypothesis. According to the CLEAR hypothesis, there is a strong drive to reduce cognitive load (to "clear one's mind"). Given two tasks, one of which is more cognitively demanding than the other, the more cognitively demanding task will tend to be done first. We tested this prediction using a novel method inviting participants to freely choose when to perform each of c = 5, 10, or 15 items per category in item-generation tasks relative to b = 10 box-moving tasks. The box-moving tasks were cognitively undemanding relative to the item generation tasks, whose cognitive difficulty presumably grew with c. A full half of our n = 122 participants chose to complete all of the c tasks before performing any of the b tasks, and most other participants chose to complete a majority of the c tasks before any of the b tasks. This result is consistent with the CLEAR hypothesis. Speed on the box-moving task decreased the later the category-generation task was completed, supporting another CLEAR prediction. The general method used here provides direction for future work on task order choices in cognitive and perceptual-motor tasks.

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Precrastination, as opposed to procrastination, is the tendency to embark on tasks as soon as possible, even at the expense of extra physical effort. We examined the generality of this recently discovered phenomenon by extending the methods used to study it, mainly to test the hypothesis that precrastination is motivated by cognitive load reduction. Our participants picked up two objects and brought them back together. Participants in Experiment 1 demonstrated precrastination by picking up the near object first, carrying it back to the farther object, and then returning with both. Also, participants given an additional cognitive task (memory load) had a higher probability of precrastinating than those not given the added cognitive task. The objects in Experiment 1 were buckets with balls that had a very low chance of spillage; carrying them required low demands on attention. The near-object-first preference was eliminated in Experiment 2, where the near and far objects were cups with water that had a high chance of spillage; carrying them required higher demands on attention. Had precrastination occurred in this case, it would have greatly increased cognitive effort. The results establish the generality of precrastination and suggest that it is sensitive to cognitive load. Our results complement others showing that people tend to structure their behavior to minimize cognitive effort. The main new discovery is that people expend more physical effort to do so. We discuss the applied implications of our findings, as well as the possibility that precrastination may be a default, automatic behavior.

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Procrastination is the tendency to put off initiation or completion of a task. Although people are typically known to procrastinate, recent research suggests that they sometimes "pre-crastinate" by initiating a task sooner than they need to (Rosenbaum et al. in Psychological Science, 25(7), 1487-1496, 2014). A similar finding of precrastination was reported by Wasserman and Brzykcy (Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 22, 1130-1134, 2015) with pigeons using a somewhat different procedure. In the present experiment, we used a procedure with pigeons that was more similar to the procedure used by Rosenbaum et al. Pigeons were given a choice between two sequences of events (concurrent chains). Choice of the procrastination chain resulted in color A, which 15-s later would change to color B and 5-s later resulted in reinforcement. Choice of the precrastination chain resulted in color C, which 5-s later would change to color D and 15-s later resulted in reinforcement. Thus, both chains led to reinforcement after 20 s. Results indicated that the pigeons procrastinated. That is, they preferred the 15-5 chain over the 5-15 chain. The results are consistent with Fantino's (Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, 12, 723-730, 1969) delay reduction theory, which posits that stimuli that signal a reduction in the delay to reinforcement, such as the 5-s stimulus that occurred immediately prior to reinforcement, serve as strong conditioned reinforcers and should be preferred. In support of this theory, the pigeons pecked most at the 5-s stimulus that led immediately to reinforcement, indicating that it had become a strong conditioned reinforcer. The results suggest that delay reduction theory, a theory that emphasizes the attraction to stimuli that predict reinforcement with a short delay, also may contribute to human procrastination behavior because when task completion comes just before the deadline, it may become a stronger conditioned reinforcer than if task completion comes earlier.

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