Abstract
When ordering tasks, people tend to first perform the task that can be started or completed sooner (precrastination) even if it requires more physical effort. Evidence from transport tasks suggests that precrastination can reduce cognitive effort and will likely not occur if it increases cognitive effort. However, some individuals precrastinate even when it increases cognitive effort. We examined whether individual differences in working memory capacity (WMC) influence this suboptimal choice. Participants retrieved two cups of water along a corridor, in the order of their choosing. We measured the frequency of choosing the close cup first (precrastination) while varying water levels in each cup (attention demand) located at different distances. Results showed that the tendency to select the far cup first (avoid precrastination) increases when the close cup is full (high attention demand) vs. not full (low attention demand). Post-hoc results showed high (vs. low) WMC individuals more frequently bypass decisions with relatively higher costs of cognitive effort, avoiding precrastination when the attentional demand of carrying the close (vs. far) cup is relatively high (close-cup full and far-cup half full), but not when it is relatively low (far-cup full). However, there was no evidence that WMC could explain why some individuals always precrastinated, at costs of cognitive effort. Instead, individuals who always precrastinated reported automatic behavior, and those who avoided precrastinating reported decisions of efficiency. Learning, the relationship between precrastination and tendencies to enjoy/engage in thinking or procrastinate, and evidence that precrastination required more cognitive effort in our task, are discussed.
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Notes
See Fournier, Stubblefield, Dyre & Rosenbaum, 2018.
Almost never means participants precrastinated (i.e., chose the close cup first) no more than 1 out of 12 trials.
The statistical conclusions were similar when each memory span task was separately included in the model.
It is also possible that participants made choices that would minimize time to complete the task, and those with higher working memory capacities were more sensitive to conserving time. It is difficult to separate time on task and attention demand, as economical strategies in terms of time (e.g., Gray, Sims, Fu & Schoelles, 2006) would affect the duration of attention deployed in this task—and hence it does not pose a problem for our hypothesis. Importantly, our participants appeared very concerned about not spilling, and travel time was influenced by this factor with participants walking very slowly when transporting the cup(s). Also, anyone who spilled even a little, stopped and steadied themselves, and also appeared distressed and often vocalized their distress. Finally, subjective reports showed that 22 participants explicitly stated they made their first cup choice to minimize spilling while only 6 participants mentioned that time or distance of the cups played a role in their first-cup choices. Thus, we believe choices appear to be driven to minimize relative carrying time of the more attention-demanding, full cup—and those with high working memory capacities may be more proactively engaged in this strategy.
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Acknowledgements
We thank Washington State University undergraduates Hannah Jensen and Erin McMeekin for their help with data collection. We also thank Cody Mashburn for his help with the span tasks used in this study that came from Randall Engle’s laboratory. Correspondence should be directed to Lisa R. Fournier at lfournier@wsu.edu.
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NR and LF contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation and data collection were performed by NR. Data analysis was performed by CK and NR. Initial drafts and the final manuscript were written by NR, as part of her master’s thesis, and LF. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Appendix
Appendix
Results of the mixed-effects, logistic regression to characterize the association of memory span, ratio, trial and participant with the probability of selecting the close cup first.
Coefficient | Estimate | SE | Wald | df | p value | Odds ratio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Constant | 2.069 | 0.998 | 2.073 | 1 | 0.038 | 7.916 |
Memory span | 0.668 | 0.881 | 0.758 | 1 | 0.448 | 1.950 |
Ratio 1 (100:100) | − 0.576 | 0.764 | − 0.753 | 1 | 0.452 | 0.562 |
Ratio 2 (100:50) | − 3.361 | 0.774 | − 4.342 | 1 | < 0.0001 | 0.0004 |
Trial | − 0.441 | 0.123 | − 3.584 | 1 | < 0.001 | 0.644 |
Trial′ | 0.294 | 0.126 | 2.335 | 1 | 0.020 | 1.342 |
Ratio 1 × memory span | − 0.017 | 0.338 | − 0.050 | 1 | 0.960 | 983 |
Ratio 2 × memory span | − 0.830 | 0.368 | − 2.256 | 1 | 0.024 | 0.436 |
Memory span × trial | − 0.047 | 0.043 | − 1.090 | 1 | 0.276 | 0.955 |
Ratio 1 × trial | − 0.334 | 0.116 | − 2.881 | 1 | 0.004 | 0.716 |
Ratio 2 × trial | 0.003 | 0.117 | 0.022 | 1 | 0.982 | 1.003 |
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Raghunath, N., Fournier, L.R. & Kogan, C. Precrastination and individual differences in working memory capacity. Psychological Research 85, 1970–1985 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-020-01373-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00426-020-01373-6