ISSN 1671-3710
CN 11-4766/R
主办:中国科学院心理研究所
出版:科学出版社

Advances in Psychological Science ›› 2015, Vol. 23 ›› Issue (2): 175-181.doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1042.2015.00175

• Research Reports • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Creating for Others: An Experimental Study of the Effects of Intrinsic Motivation and Prosocial Motivation on Creativity

LI Yang1,2; BAI Xinwen1   

  1. (1 Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China) (2 University of Chinese Academy of Scicences, Beijing 100049, China)
  • Received:2014-06-12 Online:2015-02-14 Published:2015-02-14
  • Contact: BAI Xinwen, E-mail: baixw@psych.ac.cn

Abstract:

Scholars of creativity research usually believe that intrinsic motivation is conducive to creativity. However, more and more results have challenged and questioned this conclusion. According to the latest motivated information processing model, prosocial motivation can help people think about not only novel but also useful aspects of ideas to improve the whole creativity. This study used 2×2 between-subjects design. Through the manipulation of intrinsic motivation and prosocial motivation, participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions and completed a creative task. ANOVA indicated that there was a significant interaction effect of intrinsic motivation and prosocial motivation on creativity, and only when people had high levels of intrinsic motivation coupled with high levels of prosocial motivation, they would be most creative. This study proved the importance of prosocial motivation in creative process, and opened a new perspective of creativity research.

Key words: creativity, intrinsic motivation, prosocial motivation, motivated information processing model