Self-esteem And Psychological Capital Mediate The Relationship Between Big Five Personality And Creativity Among University Students

A nation will prosper only when its young people thrive.College students are a more special group of young people.In twenty-first Century,the new economic situation required college students to be innovative.Making clear the main factors and mechanisms that influence college students’ creativity are of great significance for improving their creativity effectively.Studies have found that personality,self-esteem,psychological capital and creativity are closely related,but no research has examined the relationship between these four variables in a systematic framework.The focus of this study is to examine the main factors affecting the creativity of college students and the mechanism of their action through the structural equation model(SEM).First of all,this study revised the Person Environment Fit Scale for Creativty(PEFSC)developed by Sen,Acar and Cetinkaya(2014).Under the joint efforts of three college English teachers and researchers,the original English scale and standby project library were translated into Chinese.The first draft of Chinese version of the scale was formed.The first draft revised with 202 sample data from college studentst,the second draft of the scale was formed.A total of 732 sample used to test the second draft,formal scale was formed.The formal scale includes two dimensions,individual and environment respectively,7 pairs and 14 items,of which 5 are items in the original English scale,and 2 are supplementary replacement items.Confirmatory factor analysis showed that the two-factor model of PEFSC provided good fit with the data(χ2/df=3.094,GFI=0.919,CFI=0.918,NFI=0.884,TLI=0.902,RMSEA=0.076).The Cronbach’s α of all factors ranged from 0.799 to 0.859;the test-retest reliabilities ranged from 0.831 to 0.911.The PEFSC was of good criterion validity as well.The reliability and validity of the formal scale have reached the requirements of psychometrics,and can be used as an effective tool to measure the creativity of college students.Secondly,the study examined the influence and mechanism of personality,self-esteem and psychological capital on creativity.Because the five dimensions of Big Five personality is relatively independent,and agreeableness and creativity are not significantly related,neuroticism,extraversion,openness and conscientiousness as predictor variables,creativity as the dependent variable,and self-esteem and psychological capital as the intermediary variable,four models were constructed and tested in turn.The results show that self-esteem and psychological capital play an intermediary role in the influence of Big Five personality on college students’ creativity.Specifically,effects of neuroticism on creativity is not directly but through the mediating role of self esteem and psychological capital;The creativity can be directly affected by extraversion and can be indirectly influenced through the intermediary role of self-esteem,psychological capital as well;Openness can not directly affect creativity but through the mediating role of self esteem and psychological capital;Conscientiousness can directly affect creativity and indirectly affect it by multiple chain intermediary role of self-esteem and psychological capital.Finally,the paper puts forward some suggestions for improving their creativity by consummating their personality and enhancing their level of self-esteem and psychological capital.