The predictive power of dispositional mindfulness and dispositional serenity for creative functioning

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the roles of two positive personal characteristics – dispositional mindfulness and dispositional serenity – in creative functioning from the perspective of positive psychology. A total of 598 (51.3% females) university students in Hong Kong took part in the study. Dispositional mindfulness and serenity were assessed with the Mindful Attention Awareness Scale and the Brief Serenity Scale, respectively. By adopting a multiple-measurement approach to creativity, creative functioning was assessed with three commonly used creativity tests: (1) a divergent thinking test, (2) the Test for Creative Thinking–Drawing Production, and (3) a creative problem-solving test. Each of these tests focuses on a specific aspect of creative functioning (i.e., idea generation, combinatory ability, and restructuring ability). Hierarchical multiple regression analyses were applied to test the hypothesized positive role of dispositional mindfulness and serenity in predicting creative functioning. Lending support to the positive psychology perspective, our findings suggest that dispositional mindfulness and serenity have unique contributions to creative functioning. Enriching the discourse of the positive psychology perspective, our findings on the one hand suggest that the predictive power of dispositional mindfulness varies across aspects of creative functioning; on the other hand, however, dispositional serenity presents a somewhat consistent and stable predictive power across aspects of creative functioning. These findings shed light on improving creative functioning by promoting positive human characteristics.