Multitasking Performance of Males: Does Polychronicity Play a Role?

The study in hand was designed to compare the multitasking performance of males groups classified as high and low on polychronicity. This was carried out for normal and emergency conditions of multitasking. Multitasking has been identified as a behavior involving frequent switching between tasks over time (Waller, 2007). Polychronicity is understood as a preference for organizing activities over time. For the above purpose, the sample of 180 young adult females with mean age of 21 yrs was taken up from the tricity of Chandigarh, Mohali and Panchkula. 'Index of Polychronic Values Scale' by Bluedorn et al. (1999) and a self developed simulated task for multitasking was used for the study. t- ratios were computed to arrive at the results. Results showed that high polychronic subjects showed better performance as compared to low polychronic subjects across both levels multitasking.