Academic procrastination and its characteristics: A Narrative Review

Background: Time management, especially at university is an important factor contributing to the academic achievement of students. However, the majority of students relentlessly delay their academic work. Drawing upon the literature, it was attempted to identify the characteristics of academic procrastination in the current study. Methods: In the review, articles, books and theses in English and Persian were identified by a search of Scopus, Proquest, Pubmed, Magiran, and SID databases using the keywords such as procrastination, academic procrastination, academic consultation, academic shilly-shally, and academic dilatoriness. However, our search was not limited by a time frame. Results: 603 articles and theses were identified by searching the databases. Sifting through the information, we consulted only 27 articles and 2 theses which were relevant to our study. After a perusal of literature on academic procrastination, procrastination issues (i.e. definition, prevalence, types of procrastination, academic procrastination, and characteristics) and its associated factors were identified. Conclusions: Given that procrastination is considered as a disruptive factor in academic achievement, teachers and students can use the results of this study to identify the behavior of procrastination and related factors.