Mediational tests of the relationship between perfectionism and procrastination

While self-oriented perfectionists set high standards for themselves, socially prescribed perfectionists attempt to meet high standards they perceive others set (Hewitt & Flett, 1991b). Only socially prescribed perfectionism has been correlated with procrastination (Flett, Blankstein, Hewitt, & Koledin, 1992). This paper examined potential mediators of the relationship between socially prescribed perfectionism and procrastination. Self-report measures of academic and general procrastination, perfectionism, fear of negative evaluation, self-esteem, and self-worth contingency were administered to a college student sample ($N=108$). Results of regression analyses predicting general procrastination demonstrated that fear of negative evaluation and low self-esteem each functioned as mediators. Regression analyses predicting academic procrastination suggested that socially prescribed perfectionism may function as a mediator in models that include fear of negative evaluation, self-worth contingency, or low self-esteem. These results indicate that the function of socially prescribed perfectionism in causal models for procrastination may depend on the type of procrastination examined.