ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Personality and Social Psychology
The Dark Side of Precrastination: Exploring the Psychological Burdens of Being Too Early
Provisionally accepted
- Helmut Schmidt University / University of the Federal Armed Forces, Hamburg, Germany
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In today’s fast-paced world, where efficiency and immediacy are highly valued, one central question remains largely overlooked: When and why does early and swift action become a burden? This study focuses on the phenomenon of precrastination—the urge to complete tasks as early as possible—and sheds light on its “dark side.” Building on the three-dimensional model by Gehrig et al. (2025), we empirically examined the associations between anxiety- and compulsion-driven precrastination, chronic stress, and compulsive personality characteristics. In an online sample of adults (N = 200), anxiety-based precrastination was significantly associated with chronic stress, while compulsion-based precrastination correlated significantly with compulsive personality traits. Both subscales predicted their respective psychological correlates. These findings offer the first differentiated evidence that precrastination is not merely a sign of productivity but may also reflect maladaptive coping mechanisms. This opens a new perspective on a widely overlooked everyday behaviour—and on the psychological costs that may come with acting too soon.
Keywords: Precrastination, chronic stress, compulsive personality characteristics, neuroticism, personality traits, precrastination scale
Received: 04 Sep 2025; Accepted: 11 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Gehrig and Herzberg. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Christopher Gehrig, gehrig.christopher@gmx.net
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