Correlation between Ego States in Transactional Analysis and Academic Procrastination among University Students

Abstract

Procrastination is an area troubling people in all walks of life and hence has been a subject of discussion for psychologists all over the world. Procrastination is a tendency which is incorporated with thinking, feeling and behavioural patterns to postpone tasks to a later period by pathological decision making (Steel, 2007). Academic procrastination refers to the voluntary delay of academic tasks having some involuntary roots like anxiety, fear, perfectionism, worthlessness and hopelessness and is widely prevalent among students. There are reports establishing associations between academic procrastination and Big Five personality traits (openness, conscentiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism) especially with conscientiousness (a negative association) and neuroticism (a positive association). The present study examined the relationship between academic procrastination and personality theory developed by Dr. Eric Berne in his famous theory of Transactional Analysis, known as PAC model consisting of three ego states (P, A and C) mentioned as the states of mind (Berne,1961). Development of these ego states lead to the formation of personality in human beings according to Berne. It is the first report of the correlation study of procrastination with Berne’s ego state model.