A Comparison between the Time-Management Skills and Academic Performance of Mature and Traditional-Entry University Students

Time-management skills are acknowledged to be important but there has been little actual research on this topic with students. In this study we examined the scores obtained from 293 first-year students of psychology on a British version of an American time-management scale. The students were divided into three age groups: traditional-entry students - aged less than 21 years (N = 172); borderline mature students - aged 21-25 years (N = 50) and older mature students - aged more than 25 years (N = 71). Our analyses indicated (i) that women students in general reported significantly greater time-management skills than did men students, and (ii) that our older mature students reported significantly better time-management skills than did the other two groups. Academic performance, however, was only modestly predicted by age and scores on one component of the time-management scale.