Everyone has procrastinated something at some time or another. Whether it was reading a book, doing homework, or completing a task at work, but it just never gets done. Some people think it is just a bad habit. Others link procrastination to the word "lazy", but is that really so? Researcher, Daniel Gustavson of the University of Colorado - Boulder found that there may be a genetic reason for procrastination. Researchers came to a conclusion that procrastination and implusivity come from similar origins in our human evolution. They believe that our ancestors acted on impulse, because they were hunters and gatherers, and lived everyday like it was their last; which makes them believe procrastination stemmed from recent family evolution. To prove their findings they used twins as their subject of study, since 100% of their genes are the same. Identical twins and fraternal twins were given a test on impulse and procrastination, and as they expected, the results showed a genetic link between the two. In the future, scientists could use this information to help prevent procrastination if they can find the main reasons behind it and how we can develop techniques to over come it.
Personally, I think if people start to find out that procrastination is linked to genetics (even if this is the case) then it will give them an even more reason to not complete tasks on time, almost use it as an excuse. I have always just though that procrastination stems from a person's work ethic in which they have instilled in themselves. Some people are motivated, while others are simply not. However, while reading this article, I found it pretty interesting that when the study was done with the twins, they found that procrastination was in fact heritable.
I really like this article, mostly because i can relate. I might have this procrastination gene. Also, i agree with you that if people were given the information that their might be a procrastination gene then they would procrastinate even more. People nowadays just need a reason to be lazy and put things off till the very end.
ReplyDeleteI can really relate to this article because I procrastinate A LOT. The only thing is me and my brother procrastinate a lot, but my parents don't. Maybe the "procrastination" trait skips a generation or it is because of the culture we are surrounded by. Our generation are known for procrastinating and maybe that is because we don't know the value of work anymore. But anyway this is a really cool article.
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