An article on WebMD discusses a new perspective on why we procrastinate. Recent research suggests that it may not be perfectionism as previously claimed.
This new research suggests that lack of confidence in our ability to deal with the task may be a more pervasive reason than perfectionism, but this seems like a fine line to me. If we are a perfectionist everything we do must be perfect. Perfection is impossible so, naturally, we would lack confidence in our ability to complete the task and therefore avoid it. However, I do not think procrastination can be so easily dismissed as having a single cause. I think there are numerous reasons for procrastination, but the main reason is that it works. What??? It works??? How?
People who use avoidance as a method of dealing with problems can also procrastinate. A task is unpleasant so they avoid it and in doing so they avoid the unpleasantness. This "works" because they avoid unpleasantness - for awhile. The problem is, the immediate "fix" - the procrastination, doeosn't work well in the long run. Other people procrastinate because someone in their lives will do it for them if they put it off long enough. Again, this "works" in the immediate moment. The task gets done by someone else. However, in the long run the procrastinator never learns how to do things for themselves.
If you want to stop procrastination, it's important to examine your motivation for doing it. Find out how it is "working" for you. Determine what it costs you. See other articles on this site about procrastination; why we procrastinate, how we procrastinate, why we need to stop it, what contributes to it and how to overcome it.
See the article on WebMD, "Why We Procrastinate" .