The task of juggling multiple goals at once can be difficult. No matter how hard you try, you’ll always hit a point where you realize you can’t do it all. Only so much time in a day, right? Fortunately, there is a solution to the problem: prioritizing.

A study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology examined the factors that can affect how individuals prioritize their goals and tasks. When faced with conflicting goals, it can be difficult to decide which one to prioritize. The goal that is deemed less essential can often get pushed to the side, leading to procrastination.

In today’s chaotic working world, you need to be able to navigate the busyness of business, lest you be left behind. Consider, a study found that higher levels of procrastination were linked to lower salaries, a greater likelihood of being unemployed, and shorter durations of employment.

So, what factors affect how individuals prioritize goals? The researchers for the current study proposed that individuals are more motivated to pursue goals with a shorter deadline for two reasons.

How we (sometimes mistakenly) prioritize our goals

The first reason can be explained by the time pressure ratio (TPR). This ratio is defined as the time required to complete a task to the time that is available. The less time you have to complete a task, the more pressure you feel. The TPR also integrates a distance factor. Distance, in this case, is a measure of the difference between your current progress on a task (the actual) and your goal for the task (the ideal). Being aware of the discrepancy between your goal’s actual state versus ideal outcome can motivate you to pursue that goal over another one.

The second reason why individuals are motivated to pursue goals with a shorter deadline relates to temporal discounting (TD). If you could receive $50 right now or $55 in one month, which would you choose? Most would choose the first option. A study showed that individuals will often choose an immediate lower-quality reward over a delayed higher-quality reward. In the current study, TD was used to suggest that individuals rely on the deadline – rather than the importance of the goal – when determining how to prioritize their goals.

The researchers utilized time pressure, distance, and temporal discounting to test how individuals manage multiple goals at once and where the pitfalls lie.



