Procrastination - IELTS Reading with Practice Test, Answers And Explanation
Luyện tập đề IELTS Reading Practice với passage Procrastination được lấy từ cuốn sách IELTS Mock Test Vol 20 - Test 2 - Passage 2 với trải nghiệm thi IELTS trên máy và giải thích đáp án chi tiết bằng Linearthinking, kèm list từ vựng IELTS cần học trong bài đọc.
Procrastination IELTS Reading Answers with Explanation
❓ Câu hỏi (questions)
Question 1 - 3
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-F.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter, A-F.
1
a description of the sorts of activity people turn to instead of the task they are avoiding
2
examples of physical ailments commonly reported by frequent procrastinators
3
a link between delaying academic work and dishonest conduct
Question 4 - 9
Complete the summary below.
Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Why we put things off
Contrary to what many assume, procrastination springs neither from simple nor from clumsy scheduling; science instead traces it to how badly we regulate our own . We are quickest to postpone work we dislike, above all when merely dwelling on it eats into our or puts us on edge. Brain scans support this, showing differences in the areas that keep our feelings steady and register danger. Demanding jobs that stir up strong feelings — preparing to sit an , say — are among the easiest to put off. Those most given to delay are frequently perfectionists, or else people whose is low. Avoiding a dreaded task strips away the bad feelings attached to it, and this relief is so that it teaches us to keep delaying, even though the boost never lasts.
Question 10 - 11
Choose TWO letters, A-E.
Which TWO comparisons between employees who often procrastinate and those who do not are mentioned in the text?
A
They form worse relationships with the people they work with.
B
They earn a lower income.
C
They are less satisfied with their working lives.
D
They stay in their jobs for shorter periods.
E
The standard of their work is lower.
Question 12 - 13
Choose TWO letters, A-E.
Which TWO recommendations for getting out of a cycle of procrastination does the writer give?
A
rewarding yourself each time you complete a task
B
breaking large jobs into smaller targets
C
shielding yourself from things that break your concentration
D
being gentle with yourself rather than critical
E
ranking your tasks in order of importance
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📖 Bài đọc (reading passage)
Procrastination
A psychologist explains why we put off important tasks and how we can break this habit
A
A. To procrastinate is to postpone something that genuinely needs doing, typically by turning instead to activities that feel lighter, pleasanter and less pressing. It is a habit none of us entirely escapes. Perhaps we are drafting an awkward reply to a friend we are about to disappoint, or assembling a major report for our studies or our job; whatever the task, we busy ourselves avoiding it even though, somewhere inside, we know the sensible course would be to simply begin. Scolding ourselves, sadly, does nothing to prevent the next bout — indeed, few responses are more counterproductive. Why should any of this concern us? Because, as my own work has demonstrated, putting things off costs us far more than lost hours; it keeps company with a whole range of other difficulties.
B
Popular opinion pins procrastination on idleness or an inability to organise time, yet neither explanation stands up. What the scientific evidence points to instead is a failure to manage our moods. The link makes sense once we notice how readily we shelve jobs we simply have no appetite for. Should merely picturing a task chip away at our sense of self-worth, or leave us feeling anxious, the pull towards delay grows all the stronger. This is borne out by brain-imaging research: among people who procrastinate habitually, the regions that handle the spotting of threats and the steadying of our moods turn out to look measurably unlike those same regions in people who rarely put things off.
C
The likeliest candidates for delay are jobs that feel emotionally charged or hard going, and revising for an examination is a textbook case. A fragile sense of self-esteem makes the habit more common, and so does perfectionism, since perfectionists live in fear that others will find fault with what they produce. The reasoning is plain enough: a report never finished, or home repairs never begun, is work that nobody can yet judge. To dodge the task is also to dodge the disagreeable feelings tied to it, and because that escape feels rewarding, we are slowly conditioned to reach for delay whenever our mood wants mending. Turning to something more enjoyable delivers a further lift. Over the longer term, though, this is a poor way to keep our moods in check, for the 'mood repair' it offers is only fleeting. What usually comes next is guilt, which both sinks the mood lower and tightens the grip of the very habit behind it.
D
Why should all this trouble us? Pressed to name the price of procrastination, most people picture a loss of output, and the evidence bears that out: delay has been shown to drag down how well students perform. Yet the harm spreads beyond coursework. Tracking some 2,500 Dutch undergraduates across a single academic year, researchers found that those who admitted delaying their university work were also readier to slip into academic wrongdoing, from copying to passing off others' writing as their own. The behaviour bound most tightly to procrastination, though, was the invention of dishonest excuses to prise extra days out of a deadline. A similar pattern surfaces at work. Employees, on average, let close to a fifth of each working day drain away into delay, and the consequences are again unwelcome: a survey of more than 17,000 Canadian workers showed that self-described regular procrastinators earned less and clung to their jobs less securely, with yearly earnings sliding by roughly CA$12,000 for every single-point rise on a scale of chronic procrastination.
E
Health and well-being suffer alongside all this. A leaning towards delay travels with poorer mental health, depression and anxiety included. Pooling my studies, I have found that habitual procrastinators report a greater load of physical complaints — headaches, coughs and colds, and stomach trouble among them — while also carrying more stress and sleeping badly. Wholesome routines such as balanced eating and steady exercise are the first to lapse, and when pressure mounts these people lean more often on self-defeating ways of coping. One project of mine, following roughly 850 volunteers, showed that a disposition to procrastinate brought a 58% greater risk of poor cardiac health, even after other features of personality and background had been allowed for.
F
One way out of this self-feeding trap is to grow more skilful at handling what we feel. A sensible first move is to take charge of our surroundings and of the way we frame the task ahead. A number of research-backed techniques exist for beating back the distractions that flood our minds at exactly the moment we ought to be bearing down on the job in front of us. Calling to mind why a task genuinely matters and where its worth lies, for one, can warm our feelings toward it. Self-forgiveness and a measure of compassion after a bout of delay help, too, in loosening the cycle: we can own up to feeling bad without tipping into harsh self-reproach. Recalling that we are neither the first to have delayed nor the last blunts the sting of the criticism we aim at ourselves — and all of this makes the return to work that much smoother.
B. Popular opinion pins procrastination on idleness or an inability to organise time, yet neither explanation stands up. What the scientific evidence points to instead is a failure to manage our moods. The link makes sense once we notice how readily we shelve jobs we simply have no appetite for. Should merely picturing a task chip away at our sense of self-worth, or leave us feeling anxious, the pull towards delay grows all the stronger. This is borne out by brain-imaging research: among people who procrastinate habitually, the regions that handle the spotting of threats and the steadying of our moods turn out to look measurably unlike those same regions in people who rarely put things off.
C. The likeliest candidates for delay are jobs that feel emotionally charged or hard going, and revising for an examination is a textbook case. A fragile sense of self-esteem makes the habit more common, and so does perfectionism, since perfectionists live in fear that others will find fault with what they produce. The reasoning is plain enough: a report never finished, or home repairs never begun, is work that nobody can yet judge. To dodge the task is also to dodge the disagreeable feelings tied to it, and because that escape feels rewarding, we are slowly conditioned to reach for delay whenever our mood wants mending. Turning to something more enjoyable delivers a further lift. Over the longer term, though, this is a poor way to keep our moods in check, for the 'mood repair' it offers is only fleeting. What usually comes next is guilt, which both sinks the mood lower and tightens the grip of the very habit behind it.
D. Why should all this trouble us? Pressed to name the price of procrastination, most people picture a loss of output, and the evidence bears that out: delay has been shown to drag down how well students perform. Yet the harm spreads beyond coursework. Tracking some 2,500 Dutch undergraduates across a single academic year, researchers found that those who admitted delaying their university work were also readier to slip into academic wrongdoing, from copying to passing off others' writing as their own. The behaviour bound most tightly to procrastination, though, was the invention of dishonest excuses to prise extra days out of a deadline. A similar pattern surfaces at work. Employees, on average, let close to a fifth of each working day drain away into delay, and the consequences are again unwelcome: a survey of more than 17,000 Canadian workers showed that self-described regular procrastinators earned less and clung to their jobs less securely, with yearly earnings sliding by roughly CA$12,000 for every single-point rise on a scale of chronic procrastination.
E. Health and well-being suffer alongside all this. A leaning towards delay travels with poorer mental health, depression and anxiety included. Pooling my studies, I have found that habitual procrastinators report a greater load of physical complaints — headaches, coughs and colds, and stomach trouble among them — while also carrying more stress and sleeping badly. Wholesome routines such as balanced eating and steady exercise are the first to lapse, and when pressure mounts these people lean more often on self-defeating ways of coping. One project of mine, following roughly 850 volunteers, showed that a disposition to procrastinate brought a 58% greater risk of poor cardiac health, even after other features of personality and background had been allowed for.
F. One way out of this self-feeding trap is to grow more skilful at handling what we feel. A sensible first move is to take charge of our surroundings and of the way we frame the task ahead. A number of research-backed techniques exist for beating back the distractions that flood our minds at exactly the moment we ought to be bearing down on the job in front of us. Calling to mind why a task genuinely matters and where its worth lies, for one, can warm our feelings toward it. Self-forgiveness and a measure of compassion after a bout of delay help, too, in loosening the cycle: we can own up to feeling bad without tipping into harsh self-reproach. Recalling that we are neither the first to have delayed nor the last blunts the sting of the criticism we aim at ourselves — and all of this makes the return to work that much smoother.
