Read the passage and answer the questions given below it.
Kabir has known about his history project for three weeks. It is due on Monday. On Saturday afternoon he clears his desk, sorts his books by colour and watches a video on how to stop procrastinating. By evening he feels oddly pleased with himself, as though something has been done.
His parents call this laziness. Psychologists who study delay tend to disagree. A lazy person is content to do nothing, and Kabir is anything but content: the project nags at him all weekend. What he is dodging is not effort so much as a feeling, the dull dread of a blank page and the fear that his work will not be good enough. Turning away from the task lifts that feeling at once. Seen this way, procrastination is less a failure of time management than a clumsy attempt to manage mood.
The trick works because the brain is a poor judge of time. A reward on offer now looms large, while the same reward a week away seems faint, and a cost due on Monday hardly feels real on Saturday. Economists call this present bias. To Saturday’s Kabir, the Kabir who will be gluing pictures to a chart at midnight on Sunday is almost a stranger, and his troubles feel like someone else’s.
None of this makes the habit harmless. Delay is a palliative: the relief lasts an hour or two, and the dread comes back, usually larger. Scolding oneself often backfires, since guilt is just one more unpleasant feeling to run from. Making the first step very small tends to work better.
On Sunday afternoon Kabir opens a blank file. He types a title, deletes it, and types it again.
Which of the following best expresses the central idea of the passage?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 3
The correct answer is Option (3) → Putting off a task is often an escape from the bad feelings it stirs up, made tempting by the brain’s taste for relief now.
The passage explains why Kabir delays his project and what really lies behind the delay.
- Kabir is dodging “not effort so much as a feeling”: the dread of a blank page and the fear that his work will not be good enough. Turning away from the task lifts that feeling at once.
- The relief is tempting because a reward now “looms large” and a cost due later “hardly feels real”. This is present bias, the habit of giving more weight to now than to later.
- The writer adds that the relief does not last, and the dread comes back.
Why the Other Options are Incorrect?
Option 1: Procrastination is a form of laziness that students can overcome once they learn to plan their time better. — Incorrect. Contradicted: The passage rejects the label of laziness. It calls delay “less a failure of time management” than an attempt to manage mood.
Option 2: Present bias, an idea borrowed from economics, explains why young people so often make poor choices about money and time. — Incorrect. Too broad: Present bias is named only to explain why the relief of delay feels so strong. The passage says nothing about money or about young people in general.
Option 4: Students who scold themselves for delaying their work end up finishing it late, so self-criticism should be avoided. — Incorrect. Too narrow: Scolding oneself is one small point near the end, about what helps. The passage is mainly about why people delay.