Iqra Abdulhaq (MPhil, 2016-2018) Supervisor: Iram Fatima, PhD
The present study was conducted to investigate the relationship of self- compassion, experiential avoidance, anxiety and academic procrastination in undergraduate university students. It was hypothesized that three positive aspects of self-compassion i.e., self-kindness, common humanity and mindfulness would have negative relationship with anxiety and academic procrastination and three negative aspects of self- compassion i.e., self-judgment, isolation and over identification would have positive relationship with anxiety and academic procrastination. Further, anxiety would mediate the relationship between aspects of self- compassion and academic procrastination. Moreover, experiential avoidance would have positive relationship with anxiety and academic procrastination and anxiety would mediate the relationship between experiential avoidance and academic procrastination in undergraduate university students. Sample comprised of N = 320 undergraduate university students (men = 160 and women = 160) with age range 18-25 years (M = 20.25, SD = 1.61). Data was collected from four public sector universities of Lahore. The Self-Compassion Scale (Neff, 2011), Acceptance and Action Questionnaire II (Bond et al., 2011), State-Trait Inventory of Cognitive and Somatic Symptoms (Ree et al., 2008) and Academic Procrastination Scale (Yockey, 2016) were the measures used to collect data. Academic self-efficacy was assessed as control variable with Student Self-Efficacy Scale (Rowbotham & Schmitz, 2013). Findings from the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) showed that two aspects of self-compassion i.e., self-kindness and isolation positively predicted academic procrastination. Moreover, anxiety was found to mediate the relationship between one aspect of self-compassion i.e., over identification and academic procrastination. While, experiential avoidance positively predicted anxiety and academic procrastination. Moreover, anxiety mediated the relationship between experiential avoidance and academic procrastination.
Keywords: Self-compassion, experiential avoidance, anxiety, academic procrastination.
