Procrastination, Self-Rated Creativity and Task Creativity

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2020

Procrastination,

Self-Rated Creativity & Task

Creativity

UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM

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Abstract

This study aims to investigate the relationship between procrastination, self-rated creativity and task creativity. Two hypotheses are formed. The first hypothesis states that Procrastination and Creativity have a curvilinear, inverted U-Shaped relationship. The second hypothesis states that Self-Rated Creativity is positively related to Task Creativity.

For this purpose, a survey including items from the General Procrastination scale, K-DOCS and an Alternative Uses Task was used. 189 Participants completed the survey.

Age and Education were found to be correlated with creativity, whereas Procrastination and Self-Rated Creativity were not correlated with Creativity. During regression analysis, adding Procrastination and Self-Rated Creativity improved the model over just the control variables Age, Gender, and Education. However, Procrastination and Self-Rated Creativity were not significant in the model itself.

These outcomes suggests that there is a link between the mentioned variables, but the model is incomplete, warranting further research on this topic.

Statement of Originality

This document is written by Student Zaheer Khan who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document.

I declare that the text and the work presented in this document are original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it.

The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents.

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Introduction

Procrastination is a type of behavior that affects many people (Steel, 2007). Procrastination has been defined in different ways, but most definitions ascribe three aspects to it: (1) delay in beginning or performing a task; (2) the delay is intended; (3) it is pathological or irrational (Steel & Klingsieck, 2015). Traditionally it is considered the result of self-regulatory failure which leads to delaying tasks (Steel, 2007) and is needless and

dysfunctional (Klingsieck, 2013). 80 to 95 percent of college students have faced it. For 50 percent of them, procrastination is problematic. Nearly a third of the day is spent

procrastinating by sleeping, playing or watching TV. 15 To 20 percent of adults are affected by chronic procrastination. Over 95% of procrastinators want to reduce the time they spent procrastinating (Steel, 2007).

Procrastination is generally regarded as a negative trait and carries negative

connotations in modern societies (Haghbin, 2015; Steel, 2007). Procrastination has shown to decrease academic and professional performance and increase psychological stress (Tice & Baumeister, 2018). However, studies have suggested a positive effect of procrastination on creativity (Shin & Grant, 2020; Subotnik et al., 1999; Van Eerde et al., 2016; Zanjani et al., 2020). Creativity is novelty that adds usefulness (Goldenberg & Mazursky, 2011). Other definitions of creativity use words related to “novelty” (originality, uniqueness, divergence) and “usefulness” (appropriateness, value, meaningfulness, effectiveness, and others), but these two concepts remain essential to creativity.

The purpose of this study is to look deeper into the relationship between procrastination and creativity. What effect does procrastination have on creativity?

To find the relation between procrastination and creativity, a literature review will be performed first. Then a survey will be performed. Respondents will be asked to provide data regarding demographics, pacing style and their own perceptions of creativity. They will also be asked to complete a creative task to measure their objective creativity. This data will be used to analyze the relation between trait procrastination and creativity. Another question that arises here is about the relationship between self-rated creativity and task rated creativity. Is there a difference between how people rate their own creativity and how they are rated by others? The relation between self-rated creativity and objectively measured creativity (through the alternative uses task) will be analyzed to answer this question. Creativity is hard to measure objectively and a degree of subjectivity will remain.

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The first part consists of a literature review. Hypotheses will also be formed in this section. The second part describes the survey methodology. This is followed by the results of the survey. The final part discusses the findings and puts them into a broader context. This will be summed up in the conclusion, where limitations of the study are also discussed.

Theoretical Framework

Procrastination

Historically the word procrastination has had neutral or negative connotations (Steel, 2007; Subotnik et al., 1999). Throughout ancient Indian, Greek and Roman societies, acting slow and putting work off to a later time was seen as a bad trait. This continued in western societies and became a more prominent problem after the Industrial Revolution. In

advanced societies there are more commitments and deadlines, which provide more opportunities to procrastinate.

Procrastination is often defined as a form of needless and dysfunctional delay (Klingsieck, 2013). Generally, procrastination is associated with negative traits and is described as bad, harmful and foolish (Steel, 2007; van Eerde, 2003). Current research suggests that there is an affective, behavioral, genetic and cognitive component to procrastination (Steel, 2007).

Sometimes procrastination is described in a positive sense, but this is secondary in the usage of the concept with regard to the negative effects. The delay in performing a task can be functional. Not acting has a value, because new information may be found (Steel, 2007). Procrastination can lead to lower stress and better physical health when deadlines are far off (Chu & Choi, 2005; Lay, 1986; Tice & Baumeister, 2018). High performers show more behavior that includes strategic delay, suggesting possible positive effects (Subotnik et al., 1999), while other forms of delay show negative effects on performance (Steel, 2007; van Eerde, 2003).

Tasks can be delayed in three ways: (1) a task is avoided altogether; (2) smaller, less significant tasks are completed to avoid important or urgent tasks; (3) tasks are delayed strategically to prevent impulsiveness (Subotnik et al., 1999). The third category can be considered a form of incubation (Subotnik et al., 1999). Individuals can show different

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Reasons to procrastinate differ between individuals. Some people procrastinate as a form of avoidance (for example: fear of failure, fear of success, as a form of rebellion) whereas others procrastinate as a form of sensation-seeking behavior called arousal procrastination (Ferrari, 1992; Lay, 1986).

Ferrari (1992) proposed a model in which the General Procrastination Scale (Lay, 1986) and Adult Inventory of Procrastination (McCown & Johnson, 1989) measured

sensation seeking and avoidance respectively. A third type of procrastination that involves putting off decisions, based on the Decisional Procrastination Questionnaire was later added to Ferrari’s model (Steel, 2010).

Ferrari’s view that procrastination consists of different types has been contested. All three types can be classified as irrational delay and there is significant overlap between the different scales, meaning that there is no definitive categorization into different types of procrastination (Steel, 2010). Others have been unable to find support for arousal

procrastination (Simpson & Pychyl, 2009). Another form of delay that is sometimes grouped with procrastination is strategic or active delay, but is generally considered a separate entity (Steel, 2007). This shows the complex nature of procrastination and the problems that arise when trying to categorize it.

Factors affecting procrastination

Demographics

Age has a negative relation with procrastination (Steel, 2007; Steel & Klingsieck, 2015). People learn better how to overcome procrastination as they age, making it less prevalent in older individuals.

The relation between gender and procrastination is weak (Steel, 2007; Van Eerde et al., 2016). Men procrastinate slightly more often than women, but evidence is inconclusive.

Personality traits

Conscientiousness is strongly negatively related to procrastination (Steel, 2007; van Eerde, 2003). Procrastination is seen as a self-regulatory failure, which is a representative of low conscientiousness. A person with high conscientiousness is able to overcome

procrastination more consistently.

Neuroticism, anxiety, depression, and pessimism are positively related to

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Individuals high on these traits experience more stress. Higher stress leads to them putting tasks off more often, resulting in procrastination (Steel, 2007).

Motives

Self-esteem and self-efficacy are negatively related to procrastination, while fear of failure and perfectionism had weak positive relations with procrastination. (van Eerde, 2003). This suggests that fear of judgment or negative feedback plays a smaller part than negative beliefs about oneself in causing procrastination.

Performance

Procrastination has been linked to lower individual performance and it prevents success or satisfaction in personal, health, work and creativity domains (Subotnik et al., 1999). Procrastination is positively related with missing deadlines, task completion time and task delay. It is negatively related to task preparation time, and grades (van Eerde, 2003). This evidence shows clearly that procrastination leads to worse outcomes.

Environment and culture

Environmental and cultural factors also affect procrastination (Steel & Klingsieck, 2015). Technology and innovations have made it easier to be distracted. Culture can affect procrastination both positively and negatively. Asian cultures for example, emphasize discipline, which reduces the prevalence of procrastination. In contrast, western cultures emphasize individual freedom more, giving way to procrastination.

Creativity

As defined earlier, creativity is novelty that is useful (Goldenberg & Mazursky, 2011). Sternberg & Lubart (1992) formulated six factors that affect creativity: (1) intelligence; (2) knowledge; (3) thinking styles; (4) personality; (5) motivation; (6) resources. All these factors have linear relationships with creativity, except motivation, which has a curvilinear

relationship (inverted U-shape). Individuals with moderate motivation performed better than both low and high motivation.

Factors that increase creativity

Creativity can be increased due to several factors. Amongst Research & Development scientists who were interviewed, the five most common factors positively affecting creativity were: (1) personality traits (including curiosity, persistence and energy), (2) Self-motivation,

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(3) Special cognitive abilities, (4) Risk-orientation and (5) Expertise in the area (Amabile, 1998).

High creative self-efficacy has a positive effect on creativity (Liu et al., 2017). Having confidence in one’s own creative abilities leads to more creative outcomes. This functions like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Focusing solely on one task increased creativity (Amabile et al., 2002). Subjects reported that isolating themselves and removing distractions from their environment led to more creativity.

Meaningful urgency is another factor that positively affects creativity. Subjects who feel that their work is meaningful or important, feel like they are “on a mission” (Amabile et al., 2002).

Individuals that engage in avoidance procrastination score high on imagination. Procrastination is maladaptive in the sense of self-discipline but could lead to the discovery of new information or ideas through divergent thinking. This divergent thinking style can be a contributing factor when it comes to creativity (Díaz-Morales et al., 2008).

Factors that reduce creativity

The most common factors that reduce creativity are lack of motivation, lack of ability or experience, being inflexible, external motivation, and poor social skills (Amabile, 1998). Time pressure has also been found to reduce creativity (Amabile et al., 2002).

The higher the time pressure, the lower the creativity. Creativity decreases up to 45% on days when time-pressure is at its highest. The high time-pressure days also cause a “creativity hangover”, reducing creativity during the days after high time-pressure as well. Paradoxically, the self-rated creativity of participants was higher on days with high time pressure (Amabile et al., 2002).

An explanation for the decrease in creativity could be anxiety. Anxiety has a

detrimental effect on creative tasks (Byron & Khazanchi, 2011). High time pressure can lead to an increase in anxiety, which reduces creativity. It also functions as a mediator between procrastination and creativity (Lim et al., 2017). Procrastination causes anxiety, which in turn causes lower creativity. This aligns with the aforementioned curvilinear relationship.

Creativity and Procrastination

A curvilinear relationship between procrastination, and creativity has been reported (Shin & Grant, 2020). When a deadline approaches, a sense of urgency increases motivation

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to complete the task. When time pressure gets too high, it adversely affects creativity, a finding which other research has also found (Amabile et al., 2002).

Another form of delay that can affect creativity is incubation. In The Art of Thought by Graham Wallas (1926), incubation is one of the four stages of the creative process. According to this model it is necessary to let an idea incubate after being introduced to a problem. During the incubation period the individual consciously and unconsciously

processes information to come up with a creative solution. The effect of incubation has been confirmed in recent years (Sio & Ormerod, 2009).

Individuals that work in creative professions tend to work on projects right after the start and before a deadline, taking time off the project in the middle to work on other projects (Van Eerde et al., 2016). They do this more than their counterparts in less creative professions, indicating a relation between delay and creativity.

Procrastination creates a delay that can enable incubation. Delaying a task can also cause some of the aforementioned factors to change. Certain factors like personality are unlikely to change over a short period of time, but factors like motivation and anxiety, however, can change quickly.

After being introduced to a task or problem and determining its deadline, the incubation period starts. Individuals that procrastinate, put off the task, while still being aware of it. Over time, nearing the deadline, a sense of (meaningful) urgency can develop. This can increase motivation to complete the task and to put aside time to focus on this specific task. At this point in time, factors that affect creativity are at an optimal level.

Getting closer to the deadline, the detrimental effects of time-pressure take over, reducing creativity. Anxiety also increases when a deadline is approaching, further

compounding the negative effects. Close to the deadline, the negative effects on creativity are very high, leading to poor performance.

Based on this information, it is hypothesized that procrastination and creativity have a curvilinear relationship, specifically an inverted U-shape.

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Self-rated creativity

Rating one’s own capabilities is something that is a part of daily life. Self-estimates of abilities have been shown to correlate with actual ability (Ackerman & Wolman, 2007). Correlates were higher for ability in verbal skills, but lower for mathematical skills. The relation between self-rated creativity and task creativity has not been studied often, while self-rated creativity is widely used as the measure for creativity (Furnham et al., 2005). It is unknown if self-rated creativity is a good measure for actual creativity or not.

Furnham et al. (2005) found a correlation of 0.27 (p<0.05) between self-rated creativity (which they call self-estimated creativity or SEC) and psychometric creativity, measured with the Barron-Welsh Art Scale, where respondents are asked to draw certain items and are then rated on their creativity. Other research suggests correlations ranging from 0.30 to 0.40 (Hughes et al., 2013).

On the other hand Reiter-Palmon et al. (2012) did not find a correlation between self-rated creativity and objective creative measures, while having a large sample size. Althuizen et al. (2010) also found that self-rated creativity had lower predictive validity compared to creativity assessed by professionals. Samples in other studies also had many outliers that heavily under- or overestimated their creative abilities (Hughes et al., 2013). This creates doubt about the use of self-rated creativity as the standard in research, which warrants this hypothesis to be tested.

Hypothesis 2: Self-Rated Creativity is positively related with Task Creativity

Method

Participants

A total of 189 participants completed the survey. The sample consisted of 71 men, 116 women and 2 who did not specify their gender. The participants were mainly from The Netherlands (n=144) and the rest of Europe (n=21). Most of the participants had a Bachelor’s degree as their highest completed education (n=103), High school degree or equivalent (n=35) or Master’s degree (n=35). The sample consisted of predominantly students (n=90) or people who worked part-time (n=30), full-time (n=21) or were self-employed (n=18).

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Measures

To research the relation between procrastination and creativity, a survey was used. A survey was developed for a group of students researching the topic of creativity. The survey contained questions on different domains. Demographics were collected, including gender, age, country of residence, first language, highest level of education, and employment status.

Procrastination

Trait procrastination was measured using a modified version of the General Procrastination Scale (GPS-9) (Sirois et al., 2019). It contained nine items such as “I am continually saying I’ll do it tomorrow” and “I usually accomplish all the things I plan to do in a day”. Respondents were asked to choose a score on a 5-point Likert scale. The total score is divided by 9 to determine the procrastination score. In the collected sample, the Cronbach’s alpha was 0,85.

Self-Rated Creativity

A modified version with 11 items from the Kaufman Domains of Creativity Scale (K-DOCS) was used to measure self-rated creativity (Kaufman, 2012). Respondents were asked to rate their own creativity in five domains of their life: Self/Everyday, Scholarly,

Performance, Mechanical/Scientific, and Artistic on a 5-point Likert scale. The total score was divided by 11 to determine the score for self-rated creativity. The Cronbach’s alpha for the modified K-DOCS was 0.67.

Creativity

Creativity was measured through the Alternative Uses Task. It is a widely used measure for creativity (De Bloom et al., 2014; Silvia et al., 2008). Respondents are asked to give as many uses for a brick, as they can think of within three minutes. Answers by all respondents were rated on cognitive flexibility and originality by three raters independently. Interrater reliability was good (Cohen’s Kappa 0,77; 0,66 and 0,71 respectively). The answers were distributed along 7 categories: (1) Construction, (2) Weight, (3) Crafts, (4) Elevation, (5) Demolition, (6) Tool, and (7) Humor. How many categories each respondent’s answers fit into, determined the score for Cognitive Flexibility. Additionally, each answer was scored on originality from 1 to 5, with 1 as least creative and 5 as most creative. The total originality score was divided by the number of answers to determine the Originality score for each

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Control Variables

Control variables were included in the model to rule out other effects on the hypothesized relationship. Age, Gender, and Education were used as the control variables.

Participants were asked to provide their age in years during the survey.

For Gender the options “Male”, “Female”, or “Other” were provided. During analysis these options were classified as 1 and 2, while excluding “Other” (n=1) from analysis.

Participants were asked to choose between five levels of education: (1) Less than high school, (2) High school, (3) Bachelor’s degree, (4) Master’s degree, (5) Doctorate or (6) Other.

Procedure

The survey was developed and distributed online on Qualtrics. Links to the survey were distributed to social contacts through social media such as Facebook and WhatsApp, as well as public forums such as Reddit. A sample from a similar survey from earlier in 2020 was also used.

Analytical Plan

To test Hypothesis 1, the relationship between Procrastination and Creativity, an ordered logistic regression will be utilized with Creativity as the dependent variable, Procrastination as the independent variable and Age, Gender, and Education as control variables.

An ordered logistic regression is chosen based on the ordinal nature of the

dependent variable (Creativity). There is no set distance between the scores, yet there is a clear order. Even though the difference between categories is 1 point, the difference between “Not creative at all” and “A little creative” is not necessarily the same as between “A little creative” and “Moderately creative” for example.

The variable Procrastination will be standardized. Additionally, another variable will be generated by transforming the standardized variable by squaring it.

Three regressions will be done. The first will include only the control variables. In the second regression, the standardized Procrastination score will be added. In the third

regression, the standardized Procrastination score will be replaced by the transformed (squared) score. These three regressions will be compared to each other to test Hypothesis 1.

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Hypothesis 2 will be analyzed by looking at correlations between the variables Creativity and Self-Rated Creativity and also by adding Self-Rated Creativity to the best-fitting model from the analysis for Hypothesis 1.

Results

Descriptive Statistics and Correlations

Descriptives and correlations between variables in this study can be found in Table 1. Creativity was not significantly correlated with trait Procrastination, Self-Rated Creativity and Education. Creativity was negatively correlated with Age and Gender. Trait Procrastination was negatively correlated with Age and Education. Age and Education were also correlated.

Creativity was not normally distributed (p<0.01), showing high kurtosis (7.51) with the long tail consisting of highly creative outliers. Trait Procrastination and Self-Rated Creativity were normally distributed in the sample. The distributions of Creativity, Procrastination, and Self-Rated Creativity can be seen in Figures 1, 2 and 3 respectively.

Mean SD Range 1 2 3 4 5 6 1 Creativity 2.03 0.57 1-5 - 2 Procrastination (GPS-9) 3.04 0.74 1.2-5 0.0029 - 3 Self-Rated Creativity (K-DOCS) 3.60 0.42 2-4.64 0.1055 -0.1374 - 4 Age 30.18 14.32 14-68 -0.1500* -0.3046* 0.0977 - 5 Gender 1.62 0.49 1-2 -0.1528* 0.0551 0.0127 -0.0674 - 6 Education 3.13 0.90 1-6 -0.0513 -0.2235* 0.0927 0.4551* -0.0186 -

Table 1: n=179 for age; n=187 for gender; n=189 for Procrastination, Creativity, Self-rated creativity, Education Gender: 1=Male; 2=Female

Education: 1=Less than high school; 2=High school; 3=Bachelor’s degree; 4=Master’s degree; 5= Doctorate; 6=Other *=p<0.05

Regression Analysis

The assumptions for ordered logistic regression were met. The dependent variable (Task Creativity) is ordinal, observations are independent, there is no collinearity between variables, linearity of independent variable and log odds is assumed, and the sample is large enough (n=172)

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Age, Gender, and Education were used as control variables. The results are presented in Table 2.

Only Model 1 was statistically significant. Models 2 and 3 were not statistically significant, while the pseudo-R2_{increased. Age and Gender remained significant in Model 1}

and 2, but not in Model 3.

Adding Self-Rated Creativity in Model 4 resulted in an overall improvement. Only Age remained significant as an individual factor.

(1) Control Variables (2) Standardized GPS-9 (3) Model 2 + Squared GPS-9 (4) Model 3 + Self-Rated Creativity Age -0.0231* (0.0107) -0.0240* (0.0109) -0.0233* (0.0110) -0.0243* (0.0109) Gender -0.5887* (0.2859) -0.5821* (0.2865) -0.5576 (0.2868) -0.5454 (0.2868) Education 0.1529 (0.1805) 0.1413 (0.1825) 0.1533 (0.1817) 0.1529 (0.1810) Standardized Procrastination (GPS-9) - -0.0570 (0.1433) -0.0968 (0.1477) -0.0516 (0.1497) (GPS-9)^2 - - 0.1409 (0.1103) 0.1428 (0.1095) Self-Rated Creativity (K-DOCS) - - - 0.5585 (0.3567) n=172 LR c2_(df=3)=8.05 p=0.05 Pseudo R2_=0.0053 n=172 LR c2_(df=4)=8.21 p=0.08 Pseudo R2_=0.0054 n=172 LR c2_(df=5)=9.86 p=0.08 Pseudo R2_=0.0065 n=172 LR c2_(df=6)=12.31 p=0.05 Pseudo R2_=0.0082 Table 2: *=p<0.05; D= p=0.097

Standard Error included in brackets

Discussion

The aim of this study was to gain a better understanding of the relations between procrastination, self-rated creativity and creativity. After surveying and statistical analysis, mixed results were found.

Procrastination and Creativity

Trait procrastination was not correlated with creativity, thus not finding support for hypothesis 1. Adding procrastination to the regression model, did result in an improvement,

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implying that there is a link between the variables, but it remains unclear whether there is a linear or curvilinear relationship.

A reason why no relation was found, could be that the alternative uses task is not a good measure to test the relation between procrastination and creativity. Respondents were given three minutes to complete the task after seeing the question. A procrastinator could need more time to think about the question before coming up with creative solutions. A possible way to test this, would be to have subjects complete the alternative uses task immediately and again after a day, for example. This creates an incubation period which should help procrastinators more than non-procrastinators. After the re-test at the second day, procrastinators should have improved more than non-procrastinators. Gilhooly et al. (2013) found an increase in creativity after a mere 5 minutes of incubation. Perhaps a longer incubation period has greater effect?

Another reason why the alternative uses task in the form that it was used may not be beneficial to creativity, is the added time pressure. Time-pressure is detrimental to

creativity, despite increasing self-rated creativity (Amabile et al., 2002). It is also closely tied to anxiety which plays a mediating role between procrastination and creativity (Byron & Khazanchi, 2011; Lim et al., 2017). The effects of anxiety can vary from person to person. Procrastinators could be disproportionately affected by anxiety and time-pressure, reducing their creativity by a larger amount. Changing the alternative uses task could prove to be less practical, leading to lower response rates, but may lead to gaining a more accurate insight into the effect of procrastination on creativity, by reducing the confounding effects of time-pressure and anxiety.

Procrastination, Age, and Education

Procrastination was significantly correlated to age and education. This is in line with previous research (Judge, 2009; van Eerde, 2003). People may learn better strategies to deal with procrastination over time.

The link with education is similar. It requires a degree of self-discipline to complete higher education successfully, which is negatively related to procrastination. On the other side, education could teach people effective strategies to deal with procrastination.

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Self-Rated Creativity and Task Creativity

The hypothesis on the relationship between self-rated creativity and task creativity was not supported. Rated Creativity and Task Creativity were not correlated, and Self-Rated Creativity was not a significant factor in Model 4 (Table 2).

However, there are signs that Self-Rated Creativity does have an effect on Task Creativity. Adding Self-Rated Creativity to Model 4 in Table 2 did increase the pseudo-R2_,

implying at least indirect effects. A possible explanation could be a mediating effect of creative self-efficacy.

Self-rated creativity and creative self-efficacy are closely tied together (Reiter-Palmon et al., 2012) and having high self-rated creativity and efficacy might act as a self-fulfilling prophecy. Individuals who rate their own abilities higher, perform better at their jobs, are more successful in their careers, are more satisfied in life, report lower stress, cope better with adversity and make better use of opportunities (Judge, 2009). Having high self-rated creativity and confidence are two core characteristics of creative people (Barron &

Harrington, 1981). An individual with high creative self-efficacy is confident in their creative abilities and they might be more willing to undertake creative activities, while someone with low creative self-efficacy might avoid such activities (Reiter-Palmon et al., 2012).

Another possibility is that Self-Rated Creativity is not an accurate predictor for Task Creativity. Respondents rated their own creativity above average (Figure 3), while actual creativity was rated lower. This is a similar finding to Hughes et al. (2013) where participants also rated their own creativity slightly above average. Only a few of the respondents were rated as highly creative (Figure 1). Most respondents gave fairly straightforward answers, scoring low on creativity. Self-rated creativity has not been studied much and this research suggests that its use as a proxy for task creativity might not be completely justified. Like others have suggested, a critical evaluation of self-rated creativity could be necessary (Althuizen et al., 2010; Reiter-Palmon et al., 2012).

Age and Creativity

Age was found to be negatively correlated with creativity. On one hand it can be explained by personality changes over time. Openness to new experiences decreases over time. New experiences are crucial to creativity. On the other hand, older individuals have more experience that they can recombine into a creative solution. This is in line with

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previous research. Wu et al. (2010) found that knowledge based creativity, like in scientific fields, increases with age, whereas non-knowledge based creativity declines with age, due to functional fixedness. Other research has found similar detrimental effects of aging on

creativity (Ruth & Birren, 1985). Gender and Creativity

Another variable that was negatively correlated with creativity, is gender. Female respondents were found to be less creative than their male counterparts. It has previously been suggested that ideas of men are considered more creative than ideas of women, based on a bias (Proudfoot et al., 2015). Perhaps it is not a bias, but men really do have more creative ideas than women. STEM fields are dominated by men, suggesting that men are more drawn to problem-solving professions that require creativity, than women (Stoet & Geary, 2018).

Implications

An important implication of this study is regarding the use of Self-Rated Creativity as the standard in studies about creativity. Although it is widely used, this study has not been able to find support for this practice. Other studies have also raised questions and this is definitely a topic that needs to be researched further.

The Alternative Uses Task is another tool that could be used differently. The effectiveness of this task is very limited and could very well be confounded by factors like anxiety and time-pressure. It might be practical in its current form, but if the cost is significantly lower accuracy, the trade-off is not worth it.

Strengths and Limitations

This study was limited in its scope and duration. It was done as part of the bachelor’s program and was to be completed in twelve weeks. This severely limited the scope of the research, narrowing it to only a few points of research. The time limit also impacted the depth of research and the methods that were used. Despite the limited scope and time, this study contributed to research around creativity, a highly complex process that still needs a lot of research to understand.

A strength of this study was the sample size and the research design. The survey and statistical analysis are easily replicable for further research.

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Conclusion

The purpose of this paper was to look into the relationship between Procrastination and Creativity. An inverted U-shaped relationship was hypothesized, but not found.

Regression analysis suggests that there is another relation between these variables. The relation between Self-Rated Creativity and Task Creativity was also analyzed. It was hypothesized that there would be a positive relationship, but this was not found. There is mixed data on this topic, requiring further research.

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Appendix:

Figure 1: Creativity as scored by three independent raters (Cohen’s Kappa’s: 0.77; 0.66; 0.71)

Figure 2: Procrastination score on the GPS-9 scale

0 .2 .4 .6 .8 D e n si ty 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00 Creativity 0 .1 .2 .3 .4 .5 D e n si ty 1 2 3 4 5 Procrastination

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Figure 3: Self-Rated Creativity measured with the modified K-DOCS

GPS-9 items

1. I often find myself performing tasks that I had intended to do days before.

2. Even with jobs that require little else except sitting down and doing them, I find they seldom get done for days

3. I generally delay before starting work I have to do.

4. In preparing for some deadlines, I often waste time by doing other things. 5. I often have a task finished sooner than necessary.

6. I usually buy even an essential item at the last minute. 7. I usually accomplish all the things I plan to do in a day. 8. I am continually saying I’ll do it tomorrow.

9. I usually take care of all the tasks I have to do before I settle down and relax for the evening.

K-DOCS items

1. Finding something fun to do when I have no money. 2. Helping other people cope with a difficult situation. 3. Teaching someone how to do something.

0 .2 .4 .6 .8 1 D e n si ty 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 Self-Rated Creativity

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4. Maintaining a good balance between my work and my personal life. 5. Understanding how to make myself happy.

6. Being able to work through my personal problems in a healthy way. 7. Thinking of new ways to help people.

8. Choosing the best solution to a problem.

9. Planning a trip or event with friends that meets everyone’s needs. 10. Mediating a dispute or argument between two friends.

11. Getting people to feel relaxed and at ease.

References

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Procrastination, Self-Rated Creativity and Task Creativity