ABSTRACT

In this chapter, the failure-avoidant strategies outlined in Chapter 1 — selfworth protection, procrastination, self-handicapping, impostor fears and defensive pessimism — are examined in detail. As indicated in that chapter, failure-avoidant strategies are those which allow individuals to avoid the negative implications of failure in terms of damage to self-worth. The purpose in examining these strategies is to examine respects in which these phenomena differ, identifying points of conceptual overlap, as well as common mediating personality variables, including unproductive beliefs.