Creativity and Certain Personality Traits: Understanding the Mediating Effect of Intrinsic Motivation

Abstract

Creativity is a topic of ever-increasing interest, given its importance and applicability to literally every field. Personality traits have been frequently and predictably related to creative achievement. Amabile (1983) pointed out that individuals may have certain traits and abilities that are favorable for creativity, but whether these will actually result in achieving creative results depends on their intrinsic motivation. Additionally, under certain circumstances extrinsic motivation has been found to have a positive effect on creativity. We hypothesized a conceptual model and tested the mediating and moderating role of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation respectively in the relationship between 3 personality traits (openness to experience, self-efficacy, and perseverance) and creativity. This study, conducted in a university setting, found support for the potential mediating role of intrinsic motivation between creativity/openness to experience as intrinsic motivation partially mediated this relationship. Self-efficacy was closely related to creativity, with intrinsic motivation completely mediating this relationship. Extrinsic motivation moderated the relationship between self-efficacy/creativity and perseverance/creativity and had a negative association with creativity.