Abstract:

Collective psychological ownership has been studies as the latest issue in the field of psychology. Existing studies have not yet explored the mechanism of how collective psychological ownership affects team creativity. This study aims to address the above gaps by examining whether, when and how Collective psychological ownership has impacted on team creativity. Based on the Motived Information Processing in Group Model, this paper first empirically explores the mechanism of collective psychological ownership on team creativity. This study theorizes that collective psychological ownership could affect information elaboration, and in turn enhanced team creativity. At the same time, criteria for status promotion would moderated the positive relationship that collective psychological ownership affects team creativity through information elaboration.

In order to test our hypothesized model, we invited 101 Knowledge-based team leaders and their 800 subordinates who came from 16 big companies located in Wuhan, Zhengzhou and Guangzhou to participate in this research survey. In the end, we got 91 leader-followers dyads. As for scale to measure criteria for status promotion, we learned from Liu et al. (2013) measurement method of how to measure criteria for status promotion. Also, we adopte two items which are Adapted from the scale of Pierce et al (2004) to measure collective psychological ownership, as well as other measurements were well-established scales. Confirmatory factor analyses showed satisfactory model fit indices. Inter-rated agreement (Rwg) and intra-class correlation (ICC) value justified the aggregation of team information elaboration, Collective psychological ownership, Relationship conflict, Team Learning Behavior and Team Creativity.

A hierarchical regression analysis method is adopted to test the hypothesized model. Results showed that collective psychology ownership has a positive impact on team creativity, and information elaboration mediates the relationship between collective psychological ownership and team creativity. Criteria for status promotion moderates the relationship between collective psychological ownership and information elaboration. However, criteria for status promotion does not significantly moderates the relationship between collective psychological ownership and team creativity through information elaboration.

The present research makes some contributions to the Existing literature. First, by examining the positive effect of Collective psychological ownership on team creativity, this research proves the effectiveness of Collective psychological ownership beyond past literatures. Second, this study indicates the mediating role of information elaboration as well as its boundary conditions. For the practical implications, this research suggests that strengthening awareness of collective psychological ownership is conducive to the promotion of information elaboration and team creativity, also leaders should realize that criteria for status promotion will lead to different levels of competition, which impacts the relationship between collective psychological ownership and information elaboration.

Key words: collective psychological ownership, information elaboration, team creativity, status conferral criteria, motived information processing