Factores asociados a la procrastinación académica en estudiantes universitarios de diez países de Latinoamérica

Introduction: Procrastination affects students in different majors and impacts at the academic level. Objective: To determine the factors associated with procrastination in university students from ten Latin American countries. Methods: An analytical, cross-sectional, multicenter research was conducted in 16 Latin American universities with students enrolled in the first academic semester of 2017. Cronbach's Alpha value resulted 0.78. Responses were summed, students within the bottom tercile of the total sum were considered procrastinators and compared with the other two terciles. Association statistics were found with generalized linear models, adjusted for university of origin. Results: Students of Human Medicine and those of the Catholic University of Honduras predominated. In the multivariate analysis, the highest frequency of procrastination was identified in national universities and in the first years of study. The careers with the highest values of procrastination, ordered from lowest to highest, were Law, Psychology, Accounting, Economics, Engineering, Human Medicine, Humanities, Nursing, Administration, Business and Chemistry. The variables were adjusted for gender and used the university cluster group. Conclusions: Students from national universities tend to procrastinate more. Chemistry, Humanities and Nursing were the majors with the highest levels.