Academic procrastination and inappropriate use of social networks among university students

Academic procrastination is the tendency to delay academic activities such as carrying out tasks, studying for exams and similar. This behaviour may be related to the inappropriate use of social networks, especially by those students who procrastinate the most. The aim of this study is to identify latent profiles of academic procrastination and determine whether there are differences in terms of the areas of delay (academic activities, final degree projects, studying for exams and keeping abreast of academic tasks) and the factors of inadequate use of social networks (obsession with networks, a lack of better control and excessive use). The participants in this study were 1784 students from 24 Spanish universities. The Spanish version of the procrastination assessment scale and the questionnaire on addiction to social networks were used for information gathering. A Latent Profile Analysis, multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and multivariate covariance analysis (MANCOVA) were carried out to examine the differences between the profiles detected, delay areas and social network addiction factors. The results showed three latent profiles in procrastination behaviour: low, moderate and high procrastination. Moreover, significant differences were observed in terms of the areas of delay and network addiction factors. In conclusion, the greater the procrastinating behaviour, the greater the tendency to delay academic activities and present more frequently inadequate conduct in the use of social networks.