CHAPTER I

The Problem and Its Background

Introduction

Mañana Habit, this habit is also known as procrastination. Procrastination is the act or

habit of postponing an activity or its completion to a future time. It is also referred to as

the Mañana Habit or the tomorrow trap. The net results of procrastination are wasted

time, missed opportunities, poor performance, low productivity, self-deprecation, low

self-esteem and increased stress. The researchers knows that this is a common bad trait

to most of us but this habit has been passed on from generations. This has been a big

problem in Filipino culture. This can also be proven with Filipinos disregard of time.

Filipino time means going beyond the deadline or going beyond the meeting time

(always late)."It’s not Urgent, I’ll just do it tomorrow". This habit commonly happens

when you are facing a difficult task or a task that you don’t like doing. Think about

those moments when you pointlessly delay doing something. Most probably they are

difficult to do, takes a long time or you just don’t like doing it. If Filipino always make

an excuse or any way to delay to finish a job as soon as possible, they might be in a

hurry when the deadline is near. As a result they might tends to panic, worry too much,

overcrowding and not able to concentrate, so they might get more mistakes than a good

outcome.The enactment of Republic Act No. 10535 a few years ago only indicates that

tardiness has grown into a national pet peeve. Signed by President Aquino in 2013, the

said law aims to synchronize all clocks in the country, particularly in all government

offices as well as private television and radio stations. RA 10535 was put into effect not

only to require everyone to follow the “Philippine Standard Time” (or “Juan Time” as

coined by DOST), but also to validate the notion that we’re a country of latecomers
who love making excuses. These include among others Manila’s hellish traffic and the

classic “my clock isn’t working” alibi. That a law had to be passed just to put these

excuses to rest only confirms “Filipino time” isn’t just a wretched habit but a major

character flaw deeply ingrained in our culture. As a researchers they conduct this study

because this study aims to determine how the negative effects of Mañana Habit may

bring disease for Filipinos especially from those students who always have lots of

school works such as; assignments, projects and also their household chores, not only in

the society and community but also to their personal life. This cultural problem is also a

social problem because most Filipinos are under an illusion that they are dealing with

important urgent task but realize at the end that they are just wasting their time. Filipino

could easily determine procrastinators because almost everyone in the society is

procrastinating which causes them to inadequately accomplish productive work.

Moreover, a student who had hard time to resist the temptation of putting of duties for

tomorrow which leads them to come up against, stress guilt, late submission of class

works.