Learning from Cultural Shocks: A Cross-cultural Longitudinal Study of Expatriate Creativity

Abstract

Adopting a dynamic view of events, this study addresses two critical questions regarding expatriates’ cultural intelligence (CQ) and job creativity. First, how should expatriates respond to cultural shocks in order to be more culturally intelligent over time? Second, what is the relationship between expatriates’ CQ and their job creativity in the host country? Analyses of a longitudinal cross-cultural dataset indicate that in the presence of more severe cultural shocks, expatriates’ downward counterfactual thinking was less negatively related to their CQ, whereas expatriates’ upward counterfactual thinking was more positively associated with CQ. Moreover, CQ mediated the joint effects of cultural shock severity and downward/upward counterfactual thinking on expatriate job creativity. These findings have significant theoretical and practical implications for developing expatriate CQ and creativity.