Operationalizing Precrastination through Scientific Reconstruction

Most precrastination studies focus on international experience, while the few Russian publications primarily rely on experimental methods. Further domestic analysis of precrastination requires alternative psychodiagnostic tools. Precrastination denotes behavior motivated by the desire to urgently complete current tasks to ensure future comfort by minimizing the cognitive and emotional burden caused by these tasks. The article operationalizes this definition via scientific reconstruction. The results of a written survey (n = 92, aged 17–25) were combined with the semantic differential method and processed statistically using analysis of variance (ANOVA), the Kruskal–Wallis test, and Pearson’s correlation analysis. The survey evaluated the experience of completing tasks as quickly as possible to identify the motivations behind this urgency, as well as to determine its underlying resources. Precrastination proved to be a common phenomenon among young people, exhibiting both universal and specific components across varying degrees of urgency. A pronounced desire for urgency correlated with a clear, resource-based life strategy, while moderate and weak aspirations corresponded with a compensatory-economizing life strategy. Therefore, precrastination may serve as a marker of life agency.