Keywords

Time management behavior; Demographic variables; Factors affecting time management.

Introduction

Time is one of the most valuable assets that require careful planning and management to be effective and successful in life [1]. Concerning this, the competitive environments we live in today encourage people to plan and manage time effectively [2]. To strengthen this idea, [3] pointed out that all successful time managers are also good planners. Otherwise, in the area of globalization, poor time management costs in many ways. Therefore, people can benefit from reviewing how to manage their time effectively [4].

Although time management is crucial for everyone, it is significant for higher education students who lack close supervision and monitoring from parents [2]. Regarding the relationship between time management and academic achievement, the research finding of [5] indicates that students who are good in time management are also good in their academic achievement. Similarly, many researchers [6,7,2,8,9] found out that students’ time management behaviors have a positive relationship with academic achievement.

However, many university students complain about a shortage of time when they are asked to do assignments and other learning activities as a requirement of subjects [6]. Concerning this, researchers have been interested to investigate factors that affect university students’ time management. For instance, research conducted by [10] pointed out (i.e., watching TV, listening radio, sleeping, and unnecessary chatting are factors that affect university students time management behaviors. Similarly, [1] noted that too many emails and telephone can be a disaster for effective time management. According to Forsyth (2007), factors include emergencies, coffee breaks, telephones, social media (Facebook and messaging), and emails. Research conducted by [11] on university students showed that poor time management resulted from interruption by visiting friends, receiving calls, and engagements in social activities.

In addition to factors affecting time management, researchers were also interested to see whether there is a gender difference in time management or not. For example, research conducted by [6] found that there was a slight difference between female and male participants in the mean scores of general time management. The research finding showed that males scored greater in general time management and short-range planning whereas females scored better in long-range planning and time attitude. Similarly, correlation research conducted on time management skills, academic achievement, and academic life satisfaction by [7] revealed that in the exception of short-range planning, there was a statistically significant gender difference in general time management, long-range planning, and time attitude. In his research finding, he concluded that the score of female students was higher than male students. This research finding was also consolidated by the research finding of [12] indicated that female students reported greater time management skills than male students.

However, there was contradictory research finding where male students have better scores in time management behaviors than female students [5]. In addition to this, there was still another contradictory research finding showing that there was no significant difference in time management between female and male students [13]. A similar research result was found by [14] who stated that there was no significant gender variation in mean scores of general time management, short-range planning, and time attitude though gender difference was observed in long-range planning.

As it is indicated in the above-mentioned discussions, in the existing literature, there are contradictory research findings regarding gender and time management behaviors. These contradictions indicate the importance of conducting further research.

Besides the interest in gender difference, researchers were also interested to study whether there was a difference in time management behaviors of students based on family education status and residential area or not. For example, [15] found out that there was no significant difference between time management subscales mean scores based on family educational status. In addition to this, correlational research was conducted by other researchers to see whether students' time management behavior correlates with their residential area or not. The research result indicated that there was no statistically significant relationship between time management behaviors and residential areas [16].

In general, the presence of inconsistency in the previous research findings indicates that researching the area is still important. In addition to this, less emphasis was given to factors affecting the time management behaviors of students in the Ethiopian University context. Furthermore, it would be better if the researchers were used an independent sample T-test to see the time management difference based on a residential area. Because of these reasons, the researcher was interested to see the difference in time management based on family educational status and residential area. Considering these issues, the researcher was initiated to conduct a study to assess factors affecting time management behaviors of first-year social science stream students in Debre Berhan University.

Basic research questions

1. Is there a statistically significant difference in time management behaviors (total time management, short-range planning, time attitude, and long-range planning) between male and female first-year social science students in Debre Berhan University?
2. Is there a statistically significant difference in time management scores (total time management, short-range planning, time attitude, and long-range planning) of first-year social science students’ family educational status in Debre Berhan University?
3. Is there a statistically significant difference in time management scores (total time management, short-range planning, time attitude, and long-range planning) of first-year social science students’ residential area in Debre Berhan University?
4. What are factors affecting the time management behaviors of first-year social science stream students in Debre Berhan University?

Research methods

Study Design

The objective of the study was to assess factors affecting the time management behaviors of first-year social science stream students at Debre Berhan University. For the current research, the researcher used a descriptive survey research design to assess factors affecting the time management behaviors of research participants. It is preferred because descriptive research design is used to describe and narrate facts and characteristics of a particular individual or group [17].

Sample size

The researcher collected data about students who were attending in Social Science Stream from Colleges of Freshman in Debre Berhan University. After preparing the sample frame, the researcher selected 44 male and 61 female students as research participants using systematic random sampling.

Data gathering Instruments

To measure the time management behaviors of respondents, the researcher adapted a time management questionnaire developed by Britton and Tesser (1991). The questionnaire consisted of three components where 7 items for short-range planning, 5 items for long-range planning, and 6 for time attitude.

The questionnaire had 18 items scales ranging from 5-to-1(where 5=always, 4= frequently, 3=sometimes, 2=infrequently, and 1=never). The researcher added an open-ended question item which was used to get data about time waster that affect time management behaviors of first-year Social Science Students.

Data collection procedures

The researcher provided orientation about the objectives of the research for research participants. After getting permission and consent from participants, the questionnaires were distributed to the sampled students.

Data analysis

At the time of data entry, items with negative nature were reversely coded. The study used an independent sample T-test to examine if there was a statistical difference in time management behaviors (total time management, short-range planning, time attitude, and long-range planning) of first-year Social Sciences Students based on gender, residential area, and students’ family education status in Debre Berhan University or not. The researcher also used thematic analysis to analyze data from an open-ended item in frequency and percentage. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences/SPSS/with Version 23 was used to compute the independent sample T-test. Assumption of equality of variances was checked for continuous data about time management behaviors of research participants.

Results

Based on the data obtained, the major research results were presented in a table with the explanation to answer the stated research questions.

Background information of respondents

In this section, background information of respondents such as gender, respondents' family educational status, and residential area are going to be presented.

Table 1: Characteristics of respondents (N=105).

Regarding the characteristics of respondents, there were 41 and 61 male and female students respectively. Regarding residential areas, (54.3%) of them were from rural and (45.7%) of them were from urban areas. From Table 1 about students’ family educational status, (41%) and (59%) of them were illiterate and literate respectively.

Respondent’s time management difference based on gender, residential area, and students' family educational status.

Table2:Gender difference in time management behaviors of University students (N=105).

The first question of the study was about gender differences in time management behaviors. To answer the research question, an independent sample T-test was computed and the result in Table 2 pointed out that there was no statistically significant difference based on gender in total time management along with its components (short-range planning, time attitude, and long-range planning). The result implies both male and female students have more or less similar time management behaviors.

Table 3:Time management difference based on students’ family educational status (N=105).

The second research question of the study was planned to examine whether there is a statistically significant difference in time management based on students’ family educational status. The result of the independent sample T-test, in Table 3, showed that there was no statistically significant difference in all-time management behavior dimensions concerning students' family educational status. The result implies that students do not differ in their time management behaviors based on their family educational status.

Table 4: Time management difference based on the residential area (N=105).

The present study also investigated whether there is a statistically significant difference in time management behaviors based on a residential area. The independent-sample T-test results, in Table 4, showed that there was no difference in short-range panning, time attitude, and total time management dimensions based on a residential area. However, there was a statistically significant difference in time management based on a residential area in long-range planning. The result showed that students from urban areas scored better than those who were from rural in the mean score of long-range planning where rural (M=14.65, SD=4.09) and urban (M=16.31, SD=4.06; t (103) = -.084, p= .040) respectively.

Factors affecting time management behaviors of University students

The fourth research question of the study was concerned with factors affecting the time management behaviors of students. The data obtained from an open-ended question were analyzed using frequency and percentage in Table 5.

Table 5: Factors affecting time managements of University students (N=105).

Based on the responses of research respondents, the major factors were social media (33.33%), oversleeping (16.19%), non-academic discussion with dorm mates (11.43%), weather (Cold weather) (11.43%), mental health-related factors (i.e., depression, tension, and anxiety) (10.48%), peer interference (9.52% and non-academic life (movies, sport and other games) (9.52%) based on their influence on students’ time management behaviors from the highest to the lowest respectively. The result of the present study revealed that social media is the leading factor that affects students’ time management behaviors followed by others demonstrated in Table 5.

Discussion

The study aimed to assess factors affecting time management behaviors of first-year social science stream students at Debre Berhan University. The research results were discussed with the findings of other scholars.

Difference in time management based on gender, residence, and family educational status

As it was indicated in Table 2, there was no statistically significant gender difference among first-year social science stream students in all dimensions of time management (total time management: short-range planning, time attitude, and long-range planning). In line with the present study, researchers found out that there was no statistically significant difference in time management behaviors between male and female students [9].The finding is also more or less consistent with the findings of [6] who stated that there was a slight difference in time management behaviors of students based on gender.

However, the study was contradicted with other findings. For example, [7] found out that there was a gender difference in the time management area general time management, time attitude, and long-range planning but not in short-range planning.

Similarly, research conducted by [5] pointed that there was a gender difference in time management. According to Tesfay, male students scored better in mean scores of time management behaviors than females. The present result is also contradicted with the research findings of [13] who stated that female students did better in time management scores than male counterparts.

Concerning time management difference based on students' family educational status, the result in Table 3 indicated that there was no difference in time management dimension short-range planning, time attitude, long-range planning, and total time management behaviors. The study was consistent with the previous research conducted by [15] where their finding indicated that there was no difference in time management behaviors based on family educational status.

The study also assessed whether there is a difference in time management based on residential. As it was presented in Table 4, there was no statistically significant difference in short-range planning, time attitude, and total time management behavioral dimensions except the difference observed in long-range planning based on a residential area. In the present research, except the dimension of long-range planning of time management, the findings obtained on the rest dimensions are consistent with the previous research conducted by [16] who revealed that there was no difference in time management based on residential area as there was no observed relationship between time management and residential area.

In general, the present results of research imply that time management behaviors do not vary across gender, family educational status, and residential area except for the difference in long-range planning concerning residence

Factors affecting time management behaviors of University students

Researchers tried to dig out factors that affect the time management behaviors of the students. For example, [4] identified that social media such as Facebook and Messaging were factors affecting students’ time management behaviors. The finding of Forsyth was consistent with the present finding and as it was presented in Table 5, where research participants reported that social media (Facebook, Telegram, and unnecessary chatting) was one factor affecting their time management. In line with the current study, Kocabas and Erdem (cited in [11] found out that sleeping and unnecessary chatting were factors affecting students’ time management.

Alemu’s (2012) research finding was also consistent with current finding such as visiting friends and receiving calls were factors which affect students’ efficiency in time management. Besides the previous finding by [1] who stated that too many emails and Telephone were factors affecting time management, in the present study, the weather condition (too cold) and mental health-related factors (depression, tension, and anxiety) were found to be factors which affect students to use their time effectively and productively. The result implies that the habit of good time management requires managing and minimizing factors so that students can be effective and successful in running personal, social, and academic lives smoothly which leads to the attainments of goals.

Conclusion

All in all, the study aimed to assess factors affecting the time management behaviors of first-year social science stream students at Debre Berhan University. The result confirmed that there was no significant difference in time management behaviors of students based on their gender, students’ family educational status, and residential area. The study also identified that social media, non-academic discussion with dorm mates, oversleeping, weather conditions, mental health-related factors (depression, anxiety, and stress), peer interferences, and engagement in non-academic life are factors affecting students’ time management behaviors.

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