The Effects of Online Learning and Task Complexity on Students' Procrastination and Academic Performance

Online learning has been gaining the attention of students and instructors in recent years, a phenomenon that has only increased now that most courses are being delivered online due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. However, challenges remain for students to properly manage their time and achieve satisfactory grades in the online learning environment. In this study, we investigate how the online learning environment and varying levels of task complexity affect students' procrastination and academic performance. We collected 157 college students' online activity data. The results show that the students procrastinated more in the online learning environment than in the face-to-face setting; they likewise procrastinated more when completing high-complexity tasks than low-complexity tasks. A significant interaction effect shows that the students reacted differently to deadlines for high- and low-complexity tasks in the online learning environment than they did to deadlines in the face-to-face setting. Our findings highlight the importance of taking into account course assignment complexity when designing face-to-face and online classes.