Proactive personality and academic procrastination in graduate students: Their chain-mediation by research self-efficacy and learning adaptability

Abstract

This study explored the relationship between graduate students’ proactive personality and academic procrastination, and the chain-mediation by research self-efficacy and learning adaptability. Participants were 905 postgraduates in China (female =70%; first year =56%; humanities and social sciences =54%). They completed the graduate students’ proactive personality scale, the graduate students’ academic procrastination scale, the research self-efficacy scale, and the learning adaptability scale. Applying chain mediation analyses, results showed that proactive personality was associated with higher research self-efficacy and learning adaptability. Learning adaptability mediated the relationship between proactive personality and academic procrastination, specifically decreasing procrastination. Research self-efficacy and learning adaptability played a chain-mediating role between proactive personality and academic procrastination, with higher cumulative reduction of procrastination than with either self-efficacy and learning adaptability alone. These findings suggest a need for graduate student development and support services to aim at improving students’ self-efficacy and learning adaptability for timely school completion,