Procrastination, prompts, and preferences: Evidence from daily records of self-directed learning activities

Kazuki Onji and Rina Kikuchi

Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), 2011, vol. 40, issue 6, 929-941

Abstract: This paper presents evidence showing that a libertarian paternalistic intervention having significant but uneven effects on the student procrastination of a coursework assignment. We observe the degree of procrastination in a language course at a Japanese university with individuals’ electronic records of daily activities. With a quasi-experiment that generates variations in the frequency of interventions and the preference of students towards the course, we examine the effects of in-class verbal prompts by an instructor on the timing of task completion. We find that prompts affect behavior, especially when reinforced, but the responsiveness depends on the class preferences and the timing of interventions.

Keywords: Time-inconsistent preferences; Monitoring; Skill formation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C81 D91 I21 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:soceco:v:40:y:2011:i:6:p:929-941

DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2011.08.019

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