IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v19y2022i15p9355-d876618.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Chain Mediating Effect of Negative Perfectionism on Procrastination: An Ego Depletion Perspective

Author

Listed:
  • Yan Zhang

    (Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
    Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China)

  • Xinwen Bai

    (Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
    Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China)

  • Wanyi Yang

    (Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
    Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China)

Abstract

Extant research has consistently demonstrated that negative perfectionism is an important driver of procrastination. However, existing studies suffer from several salient limitations, such as an inadequacy in understanding its mediating mechanism, and the lack of an overarching theoretical framework. Accordingly, the present study adopts the ego depletion theory to investigate how and under what conditions negative perfectionism leads to procrastination. Specifically, we propose that fear of failure and ego depletion serially mediate the effect of negative perfectionism on procrastination, and that cognitive flexibility moderates this chain mediating effect. A three-wave survey consisting of 490 participants, in which negative perfectionism was measured in the first survey, fear of failure and ego depletion were measured in the second, and procrastination was measured in the last survey, lends support to all of our hypotheses. Specifically, our results indicate that (a) negative perfectionism influences procrastination through the chain mediating effect of fear of failure and ego depletion; (b) cognitive flexibility moderates the effect of fear of failure on ego depletion in that the effect is weaker when cognitive flexibility is high rather than low; and (c) cognitive flexibility moderates the chain mediating effect of negative perfectionism on procrastination, such that this chain mediation is weaker when cognitive flexibility is high rather than low. Our findings are discussed in terms of the theoretical contribution to reveal the mechanism by which negative perfectionism results in negative effects from the novel perspective of ego depletion.

Suggested Citation

  • Yan Zhang & Xinwen Bai & Wanyi Yang, 2022. "The Chain Mediating Effect of Negative Perfectionism on Procrastination: An Ego Depletion Perspective," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-13, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:15:p:9355-:d:876618
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/15/9355/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/15/9355/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Allison P. Sederlund & Lawrence R. Burns & William Rogers, 2020. "Multidimensional Models of Perfectionism and Procrastination: Seeking Determinants of Both," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(14), pages 1-32, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lindsay Duncan & Gita Taasoobshirazi & Ashana Vaudreuil & Jitendra Sai Kota & Sweta Sneha, 2023. "An Evaluation of Impostor Phenomenon in Data Science Students," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(5), pages 1-13, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.

      Corrections

      All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:15:p:9355-:d:876618. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

      If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

      If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

      If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

      For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

      Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

      IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.