The Role of Achievement Motivation and Test Anxiety in Predicting Students' Self-handicapping and Procrastination

The aim of the present study was to determine the role of the achievement motivation and test anxiety in predicting students' self-handicapping and procrastination. The method was descriptive-correlational, and the statistical population included all young students of the University of Applied Sciences and Technology of East Tehran; who were studying in one of the faculties of this university in the academic year of 2017-2018. The Cochran's sample size estimation formula was used to determine the sample size, which were 340 people. The sampling was done on a basis of a random multi-step way. Edward E. Jon's self-efficacy scale, Herman's motivated progress, Solomon's and Rathblum's procrastination, and Sarason's test anxiety were used in the study in order to collect the data. The SPSS 24 and Pearson correlation and canonical correlation methods were used to analyze the data. The findings showed that predicting the variable of procrastination based on test anxiety variables and achievement motivation is significant (p<0.0001 and F=245/951), and predicting the variable of self-handicapping based on the variables of test anxiety and achievement motivation was significant, too (P<0.0001 and F=1190/904). It seems that increasing the achievement motivation and reducing the test anxiety is a key factor in reducing procrastination and self-handicapping.