Social Psychology

Self-Handicapping Urdan, Tim, and Carol Midgley. 2001. "Academic Self-Handicapping: What We Know; What More There Is to Learn." Educational Psychology Review 12:2, 115-130. Urdan and Midgley's paper is a summary of their recent research on the topic of students, especially college students, who use self-handicapping in response to academic challenges. They explore the reasons for it as well as the short- and long-term effects of such behavior. Their theoretical basis is goal theory, looking to see how goal-setting affects academic performance and the behavior of academic self-handicapping.

They conducted four studies over the five years before this article was published, looking at academic self-handicapping from several perspectives and refining their approach with each study. They defined "self-handicapping" very specifically. They noted that most researchers view it as deliberately setting obstacles in their way of good school performance. Some of those behaviors include procrastination, lack of effort or practice, excuse-making, lack of sleep, over-socialization to the expense of working on school work, and drug or alcohol use.

Other possible strategies but which the students might have lessened control over include shyness, moodiness and illness. Before summarizing their research to date, looking for patterns and divergence from patterns, they summarized the literature on the topic. After reviewing their research, they discussed the implications and pointed the way toward further research. The analysis of their research as well as other work on the topic demonstrates that self-handicapping behavior is a complex behavior with personal factors affecting both the choice to self-handicap and the methods chosen to accomplish that goal.

In most of their research they found that self-handicapping does not stem just because the student has a fear of academic failure. Rather, these students are concerned about how they will appear to others if they perform poorly.

If they have a credible excuse for poor performance such as "I would have done better but I didn't study," or "I drank so much last night -- who can think when they're hung over?" -- they did not have to look like a student who can't achieve but rather as a student who can but does not. It's face-saving behavior. However, there is also evidence from the research that while these students may fool others, they do not fool themselves.

Often they have poor self-esteem and self-handicap because they believe they are likely to perform poorly on the task. However, they feel better about themselves when they get a low grade on a project, paper or test if they sabotaged their efforts on the task beforehand. This is an important point: self-handicapping is actions taken before or during the task, not simply excuse making afterwards.

A student might say "Well, I had too much to drink last night" to explain away a low grade even if he or she had not. The student who self-handicaps really does things before hand or during the task that will help guarantee poor performance. One particularly negative outcome from chronic self-handicapping.