The relationship between adolescents’ resilience and their malevolent creative behaviors

doi:10.3724/SP.J.1041.2022.00154

Abstract

Abstract:

Malevolent creativity is distinguished from general creativity due to its “harmfulness”. Given that positive personality traits (e.g., resilience) may promote general creativity but inhibit malevolence, it is unclear what the dominant role of resilience in malevolent creativity is. To tackle this issue, two studies were conducted with the hypothesis that higher resilience may predict less malevolent creativity via the weakened malevolence. A moderated mediation model was further proposed to investigate the roles of coping styles and stress in the relationship between adolescents’ resilience and their malevolent creative behaviors. The results showed that: 1) The resilience was negatively correlated with their malevolent creativity behavior; 2) Coping styles played a complete mediating role in the relationship between resilience and malevolent creativity; 3) The mediating effect of positive coping was moderated by stress where stressful situations weakened the inhibitory effect of positive coping on malevolent creativity. These results indicate that cultivating the resilience of young people will resist the adverse effects of stressful situations, and it is necessary to guide the development of their creative ability.

Key words: malevolent creativity, resilience, coping styles, stress, adolescent

WANG Dan, WANG Dianhui, CHEN Wenfeng. (2022). The relationship between adolescents’ resilience and their malevolent creative behaviors. Acta Psychologica Sinica, 54(2), 154-167.

Figures/Tables 8

References 69

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Variable	M	SD	1	2	3	4
1. Resilience	57.60	14.41	1
2. Positive coping	22.05	5.88	0.85^***	1
3. Negative coping	9.44	3.59	-0.82^***	-0.78^**	1
4. Malevolent creative behavior	12.08	4.14	-0.64^***	-0.65^***	0.63^***	1

Variable	M	SD	1	2	3	4
1. Resilience	57.60	14.41	1
2. Positive coping	22.05	5.88	0.85^***	1
3. Negative coping	9.44	3.59	-0.82^***	-0.78^**	1
4. Malevolent creative behavior	12.08	4.14	-0.64^***	-0.65^***	0.63^***	1

Regression equation		Fitting index		Significance of regression coefficient
Outcome variable	Predictive variable	R	R²	F	β	t
Positive coping		0.86	0.74	342.02
	Gender				0.11	4.16^***
	Age				-0.02	-0.90
	Resilience				0.84	30.72^***
Negative coping		0.82	0.68	251.99
	Gender				-0.15	0.22
	Age				0.05	0.70
	Resilience				-0.21	-26.97^***
Malevolent creative behavior		0.73	0.53	79.57
	Gender				0.05	1.44
	Age				-0.02	-0.58
	Resilience				-0.20	-2.69
	Positive coping				-0.56	-7.90^***
	Negative coping				0.17	0.08^*

Regression equation		Fitting index		Significance of regression coefficient
Outcome variable	Predictive variable	R	R²	F	β	t
Positive coping		0.86	0.74	342.02
	Gender				0.11	4.16^***
	Age				-0.02	-0.90
	Resilience				0.84	30.72^***
Negative coping		0.82	0.68	251.99
	Gender				-0.15	0.22
	Age				0.05	0.70
	Resilience				-0.21	-26.97^***
Malevolent creative behavior		0.73	0.53	79.57
	Gender				0.05	1.44
	Age				-0.02	-0.58
	Resilience				-0.20	-2.69
	Positive coping				-0.56	-7.90^***
	Negative coping				0.17	0.08^*

Variable	M	SD	1	2	3	4
1. Resilience	58.86	14.98	1
2. Positive coping	22.45	5.92	0.85^**	1
3. Negative coping	9.16	3.40	-0.79^**	-0.75^**	1
4. Malevolent creative behavior	11.80	3.50	-0.62^**	-0.55^**	0.48^**	1