Science of procrastination

So, for example, my desire to finish this article is influenced by my relative confidence in writing it well and the prospect of a paycheck as well as a looming deadline and my inherent desire to go home at the end of the day. "You're more likely to put something off if you're a very impulsive individual," Steel says. But, "if you only work at the last minute, time on task tells..."

But the problem of procrastination, which Steel came to by suffering from a particularly acute case of it in his own schooling, may have broader applications. The equation to describe it, dubbed temporal motivational theory, may be applicable to the entire field of human motivation. "You can use it to predict stock prices and other theories of motivation, such as goalsetting, can be derived from it," Steel notes. "Even the behavior of nations and groups can be better described by using this theory."