AFFECT
Summary
Research has demonstrated a positive relationship between general promotion focus and creativity. In our study we investigated the mediating mechanisms of this
relationship. Regulatory Focus Theory proposes that affect related to promotion focus is associated with the positive affectivity dimension. We tested a multiple mediation model with day-specific promotion focus and day-specific positive affect as mediators. We gathered data of 122 employees from the advertising industry, who filled in questionnaires on two consecutive working days. The results support our hypotheses. The relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity is mediated by day-specific promotion focus and day-specific positive activating affect. The results indicate that general promotion focus is associated with higher creativity on a specific day, because on this day the employees are more promotion-focused and experience more positive affect.
Introduction
To be successful organizations rely on creative employees (Amabile, 1996;
Oldham & Cummings, 1996). Considering that some employees are more creative than others, interindividual differences are an important topic for research on
employee creativity (Oldham & Cummings, 1996; Scott & Bruce, 1994; Tierney et al., 1999). Research indentified promotion focus as an important antecedent of employee creativity (Kark & Van Dijk, 2007; Neubert et al., 2008). Regulatory Focus Theory distinguishes two regulatory foci: Promotion and prevention focus (Higgins,
1997).Promotion focus is a self-regulatory principle that determines the needs and goals of a person (Brockner & Higgins, 2001). Promotion-focused people seek to satisfy their growth and developmental needs and they try to accomplish goals that represent their ideal selves (Brockner & Higgins, 2001; Higgins, 1997). In contrast, prevention-focused people have security needs and try to satisfy the expectations of their environment (Brockner & Higgins, 2001; Higgins, 1997). Promotion focus behavior is characterized by eagerness and risk-taking (Kark & Van Dijk, 2007).
Thus, it is apparent that in the field of creativity promotion focus is particularly relevant (Kark & Van Dijk, 2007; Neubert et al., 2008). Although research demonstrated that generally promotion-focused employees are more creative
(Neubert et al., 2008; Q. Zhou, Hirst, & Shipton, 2012), is it not fully investigated why generally promotion-focused employees are more creative on a specific day. As research on regulatory focus turned to organizational settings, Brocker and Higgins (2001) emphasized that it is important to investigate the mediators in the relationship between regulatory focus and behavioral outcomes. We address this gap and
investigate two mechanisms that link general promotion focus to creativity on a specific day. In more detail, we look at day-specific promotion focus and day-specific
positive affect as mediators in the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity.
First, promotion focus has a general component that represents stable differences between persons and it has a specific component that reflects the situational influences on the person (Stam et al., 2010). Experimental research demonstrated that a person’s promotion focus can be manipulated by situational cues (Friedman & Förster, 2001). Moreover, this situation-specific promotion focus fostered creativity. In our study, we account for this less stable component of promotion focus by investigating day-specific promotion focus as a mediator in the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity. Second, research on the link between promotion focus and creativity has so far neglected that in addition to the behavioral consequences, scholars assume that promotion focus influences a person’s affective experience (Brockner & Higgins, 2001; Higgins, 1997). In terms of the two major taxonomies of affect (Russell, 1980; Watson et al., 1999), promotion-focused employees experience activating positive affect when they achieve their goals and deactivating negative affect when they miss their goals, while prevention-focused affect ranges from deactivating positive affect in case of success and activating negative affect in case of failure (Brockner & Higgins, 2001). Brockner and Higgins (2001) point out the importance to delineate the relationship between promotion focus and affect and promotion focus and behavioral outcomes. They argue that researchers should investigate affect as both a consequence of promotion focus and an antecedent of behavioral outcomes. Past research has demonstrated a positive relationship between creativity and positive affect (Amabile et al., 2005;
Binnewies & Wörnlein, 2011). However, meta-analytic findings have examined the relationship between positive affect and creativity in more details (Baas et al., 2008).
Results show that positive affect fosters creativity only when it is activating and
associated with promotion focus. Considering these findings, we propose day-specific positive affect as a second mediator in the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity.
Taken together, the aim of our study is to investigate the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity. Specifically, we examine the role of day-specific positive activating affect and day-specific promotion focus both as consequences of general promotion focus and antecedents of creativity. Thereby, we demonstrate that the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity is not simply due to day-specific promotion focus, but is also due to
increased day-specific positive affect. We contribute to the literature by examining a multiple mediation model with day-specific positive affect and day-specific promotion focus as mediators in the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity. Thus, we integrate the research of both promotion focus and positive activating affect as antecedents of creativity, in order to enable a better understanding why promotion focus is beneficial for creativity.
Promotion Focus
Regulatory Focus Theory is a topic that receives growing research attention (Lanaj, Chang, & Johnson, 2012). Higgins (1997) proposes that the regulatory focus shapes the self-regulation processes of a person. The theory distinguishes between two self-regulatory foci: promotion and prevention focus. People who are promotion-focused have an approach motivation and seek to achieve desired end-states (Higgins, 1997). On the contrary, prevention-focused people have a motivation to avoid undesired end-states (Higgins, 1997). Thus, promotion-focused employees seek to engage in behaviors that bring them closer to accomplish a task, while prevention-focused employees seek to avoid behaviors that interfere with task
accomplishment. Moreover, the needs and goals of a person and the psychological relevance of a situation vary regarding to the person’s regulatory focus (Brockner &
Higgins, 2001; Higgins, 1997). On the one hand, promotion focus is associated with growth and developmental needs and goals that represent the ideal self of a person.
Situations with the presence and absence of positive outcomes are particularly salient for promotion-focused people (Brockner & Higgins, 2001). On the other hand, prevention focus is associated with security needs and goals that represent the ought self of a person. The presence or absence of negative outcomes is salient for
prevention-focused people (Brockner & Higgins, 2001). However, both regulatory foci are rather independent than end-points on a continuum (Förster, Higgins, & Bianco, 2003).
Scholars argue that promotion focus is particularly relevant for employee creativity because promotion-focused employees are eager and willing to take risks in order to accomplish their task (Friedman & Förster, 2001; Kark & Van Dijk, 2007).
According to experimental research, promotion-focused people are more open to change (Liberman et al., 1999), engage in a relational elaboration style (Zhu &
Meyers-Levy, 2007), have increased attentional flexibility (Friedman & Förster, 2005), and produce more alternatives in order to achieve success (Crowe & Higgins, 1997).
Considering these previous findings, we propose that employees with a general promotion focus are more creative on a specific day.
Hypothesis 1: General promotion focus is positively related to day-specific creativity.
Day-specific Promotion Focus and Creativity
The dispositional tendency to be promotion or prevention-focused goes back to experiences during early childhood (Higgins & Silberman, 1998). The interaction
with significant others shapes a child’s regulatory focus. A nurturance-oriented parenting style can instill a promotion focus and a security-oriented parenting style can instill a prevention focus. Even though people develop a disposition to be promotion-focused, the strength of the promotion focus depends on the context (Lanaj et al., 2012). Stam et al. (2010) distinguish between a chronic, general
promotion focus and a situation-specific promotion focus. Experimental research has demonstrated that simple cues such as the framing of the task can elicit a situation-specific promotion focus (Higgins et al., 1997). By telling the participants that they could win extra money, the researchers made the positive outcome more salient and thus induced a promotion focus (Higgins et al., 1997).
Every day employees are faced with behaviors and circumstances that influence their regulatory focus (Brockner & Higgins, 2001). For example, a reward for being successful can elicit a promotion focus when the success is associated with the accomplishment of a positive outcome (vs. successfully preventing negative consequences). Experimental research has demonstrated that participants showed increased attentional flexibility and creativity after the presentation of promotion-focus cues (Friedman & Förster, 2001, 2005). Therefore, we propose that employees are more creative on days when they are highly promotion-focused.
Nonetheless, generally promotion-focused employees actively seek situations that offer the opportunity to achieve positive outcomes (Brockner & Higgins, 2001).
Thus, employees have the tendency to maintain their general regulatory focus. A recent meta-analysis revealed that persons who are promotion-focused in their general life domains are also more promotion-focused at work (Lanaj et al., 2012).
Even though the day-specific promotion focus is influenced by situational cues, we propose generally promotion-focused employees are more promotion-focused in a specific situation and therefore more creative in this situation.
Taken together, we hypothesize that generally promotion-focused employees are more creative on a specific day, because their general promotion focus fosters the promotion focus on this day.
Hypothesis 2: General promotion focus is positively related to day-specific promotion focus.
Hypothesis 3: Day-specific promotion focus is positively related to day-specific creativity.
Hypothesis 4: Day-specific promotion focus mediates the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity.
Positive Affect and Creativity
The affective experience influences an employee’s behavior at work (Brief &
Weiss, 2002; Forgas & George, 2001; Fritz & Sonnentag, 2009; Ilies, Scott, & Judge, 2006). Affect describes feelings that are consciously accessible and do not
necessarily refer to a specific object (Fredrickson, 2001). According to the two major taxonomies of affect (Russell, 1980; Watson et al., 1999), affective experiences are classified along the valence (positive vs. negative) and arousal (high vs. low)
dimensions (Russell, 1980; Watson et al., 1999). Past research on the influence of affect on creativity has shown that the experience of positive affect is positively related to increased creativity during the following working day (Amabile et al., 2005;
Binnewies & Wörnlein, 2011).
Scholars have suggested different explanations why positive affect fosters
creativity. First, the Broaden-and-Build Theory assumes that positive affect broadens a person’s thought and action repertoire (Fredrickson, 1998, 2001). According to this theory, people who experience positive affect are more creative, because they are more playful, explorative and take different views on things. Second,
neuropsychologists assume that the relationship between positive affect and
creativity can be explained by the dopamine level (Ashby et al., 1999). Positive affect is associated with an increased dopamine release. The increased dopamine level enhances cognitive flexibility and thus fosters creativity. Third, from a “mood-as-input” perspective, positive affect signals a safe situation (Forgas & George, 2001;
Schwarz & Clore, 1983). In safe situations, employees might take risks and try out novel approaches because they do not fear negative consequences in case of failure.
Importantly, meta-analytic findings showed that the link between positive affect and creativity occurred only for activating positive affect and not for deactivating positive affect (Baas et al., 2008). Considering the previous findings, we propose that activating positive affect fosters creativity.
Hypothesis 5: Day-specific positive affect is positively related to day-specific creativity.
Positive Affect and Promotion Focus
A persons’ regulatory focus influences the affect he or she experiences (Brockner & Higgins, 2001). Brockner and Higgins (2001) emphasize that the different affective experiences associated with both regulatory foci leads to different work behaviors. Affect associated with promotion focus varies from cheerful in case of success to dejected in case of failure; whereas affect associated with prevention focus varies from quiescence (success) to agitation (failure). Thus, a person’s affective response to success or failure varies depending on the person’s regulatory focus. In terms of the two major taxonomic dimensions of affect valence and arousal (Russell, 1980; Watson et al., 1999), affect associated with promotion focus has either a positive valence/high arousal (success) or negative valence/low arousal
(failure), while affect associated with prevention focus has either a positive valence/low arousal (success) or negative valence/high arousal (failure). This distinction is important, because as we pointed out earlier only affect with a positive valance and high arousal fosters creativity (Baas et al., 2008). Thus, generally
promotion-focused employees are more likely to experience activating positive affect.
Our reasoning is that promotion focus fosters creativity indirectly via activating positive affect. We propose that generally promotion-focused employees are more creative because they experience more positive activating affect.
Hypothesis 6: General promotion focus is positively related to day-specific positive affect.
Hypothesis 7: Day-specific positive affect mediates the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity.
Method Procedure and Sample
We conducted an online study with employees of advertising agencies in Germany1. We selected the advertising industry, because in this field being creative is part of the job (Stuhlfaut & Windels, 2012). We contacted employees of advertising agencies via telephone and informed them about our study and the procedure of the data collection. Participation was rewarded with a feedback of our study results.
Employees who agreed to participate received two emails with links to online questionnaires, one on Monday (Time 1) and one on Tuesday (Time 2). A total of 182 employees participated in our study. Both questionnaires were completed by 146 participants. Protocol data indicated that out of these 146 participants 24 filled in at
1 The sample used in this study was a different one than the sample of Study 2.
least one questionnaire on a wrong day. These participants were excluded from further analysis.
The final sample comprised 122 participants (61% male). The mean age of the participants was 41.24 years (SD = 11.20). On average, participants worked 15.29 years (SD = 9.58) in the advertising field and 8.29 years (SD = 6.57) for their current employer. The majority (N = 111) indicated that they worked in the advertising
production and the remaining participants indicated they worked in the
administration. More than half of the participants (N = 69) held a college degree and 93 persons held a leadership position.
Measures
To minimize common method variance we collected our data with two questionnaires on different days (Podsakoff et al., 2003). In the first questionnaire (Time 1), we measured general promotion focus and day-specific activating positive affect as a control variable. In the second questionnaire (Time 2), we measured day-specific promotion focus, day-day-specific activating positive affect, and day-day-specific creativity.
General promotion focus. We measured general promotion focus with the Work Regulatory Focus Scale (Neubert et al., 2008). The scale includes three dimensions with three items for each dimension: Gains (“I tend to take risks at work in order to achieve success”), achievement (“I focus on accomplishing job tasks that will further my advancement”), and ideals (“My work priorities are impacted by a clear picture of what I aspire to be”). Participants indicated to what extend the statements applied on a 5-point scale, ranging from 1 (not at all) to 5 (completely). Cronbachs’s alpha was .82.
Day-specific promotion focus. We framed the items of the Work Regulatory Focus Scale (Neubert et al., 2008) to the respective day (e.g. “Today, I took risks at work in order to achieve success) and we excluded three items that were not
adequate for a day-specific framing (“a chance to grow is an important factor for me when looking for a job“, „if my job did not allow for advancement, I would likely find a new one“, and „if I had an opportunity to participate on a high-risk, high-reward project I would definitely take it“). Participants indicated to what extend the
statements applied on a 5-point scale, ranging from 1 (not at all) to 5 (completely).
Cronbach’s alpha was .82.
Day-specific positive affect. We measured activating positive affect with three items from Baas, De Dreu, and Nijstad (2008). We asked the participants to indicate on a 5-point scale (ranging from 1 = not at all to 5 = strongly) to which extend they felt “happy”, “upbeat”, and “elated” at the moment. We measured day-specific activating positive affect at both times, because we controlled for activating positive affect at Time 1. Cronbach’s alpha was .79 at Time 1 and .73 at Time 2.
Day-specific creativity. Creativity was assessed with the 9-item scale from (Tierney et al., 1999). The 5-point scale measures the extend of creative approaches employees show during work. A sample items is: “During my work I tried out new ideas and approached to problems”. Cronbach’s alpha was .88.
We conducted Confirmatory Factor Analyses to examine whether the
constructs measured at the same time were distinct from each other. At Time 1, the two-factor model with distinct factors for general promotion focus and day-specific positive affect (χ2 (50) = 71.74, CFI = .95, RMSEA = .06, SRMR = .06) showed a better fit than the one-factor model (χ2 (52) = 132.55, CFI = .82, RMSEA = .11, SRMR = .16; ∆χ2 (2; N = 122) = 62.81, p < .001). Likewise at Time 2, the three-factor model with distinct factors for day-specific creativity, day-specific promotion focus,
and day-specific positive affect (χ2 (132) = 214.37, CFI = .98, RMSEA = .07, SRMR = .05) showed a better fit than the best fitting two-factor model (χ2 (143) = 270.45, CFI
= .97, RMSEA = .09, SRMR = .10; ∆χ2 (2; N = 122) = 56.08, p < .001).
Results Descriptive Statistics
Table 4.1 displays the means, standard deviations, and correlations among all variables used in our analysis.
Table 4.1. Means, standard deviations, and correlations among the study variables (N =122)
Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5
1 Positive affect t1 2.24 0.81 -
2 General promotion focus t1 3.13 0.68 .17 -
3 Positive affect t2 2.29 0.76 .42** .25** -
4 Day-specific promotion focus t2 2.20 0.80 .20* .52** .39** -
5 Creativity t2 2.62 0.84 .21* .28** .39** .56** -
Note. ** p < .01, * p < .05.
Hypotheses Testing
To test our hypotheses, we conducted a hierarchical regression analysis predicting day-specific creativity. In the first step, we entered our control variable positive affect at Time 1 into the model. In the second step, we added general
promotion focus and in the third step, we added day-specific promotion focus at Time 2 and positive affect at Time 2. The results are displayed in Table 4.2.
Table 4.2. Hierarchical regression analysis predicting creativity at Time 2
Step 1 Step 2 Step 3
β t β t β t
Positive affect t1 0.22 2.32* 0.17 1.87 0.04 0.41
General promotion focus t1 0.31 2.85** -0.04 -0.39
Positive affect t2 0.20 2.10*
Day-specific promotion focus t2 0.53 5.49**
R2 .04 . .10 .35
F 5.40* 6.90** 15.93**
∆R2 .04 .06 .25
F 5.40* 8.09** 22.50**
Note. * p < .05; ** p < .01
In line with Hypothesis 1, the second step of the hierarchical regression analysis shows that general promotion focus was positively related to day-specific creativity. To test Hypothesis 2, we conducted a linear regression predicting day-specific promotion focus. The results are displayed in Table 4.3. General promotion focus was positively related to day-specific promotion focus (β = .59, p < .001), supporting Hypothesis 2. As seen in Table 4.2, the third step of the hierarchical regression analysis supports Hypothesis 3. Employees with a higher day-specific promotion focus were more creative on that day. Moreover, in the same step of the hierarchical regression the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity became insignificant. According to the causal steps approach suggested by Baron and Kenny (1986), mediation testing includes the test of three conditions: First, the independent variable has to be related to the mediator. Second, the independent variable has to be related to the outcome variable. Third, when both the mediator and the independent variable are added as predictors of the outcome
variable, the mediator has to be significant, while the independent variable has to be non significant. Regarding the test of day-specific promotion focus as a mediator in the relationship between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity all three conditions have been met. Thus, the results support Hypothesis 4.
Hypothesis 5 states that employees who experience positive affect are more creative on that day. The third step of the hierarchical regression analysis provides support for this hypothesis: day-specific positive affect was related to day-specific creativity (see Table 4.2). To test Hypothesis 6, we conducted a linear regression predicting positive affect at Time 2 (see Table 4.3). The results are in line with Hypothesis 6, general promotion focus was related to day-specific positive affect at Time 2 (β = .20, p < .05). Moreover, all three conditions of the causal step approach necessary to test day-specific positive affect as a mediator in the relationship
between general promotion focus and day-specific creativity have been met. Thus, the results support Hypothesis 7.
Table 4.3. Regression analyses predicting the mediators at Time 2
Outcome Day-specific promotion focus
t2
Positive affect t2
β t β t
Positive affect t1 .12 1.49 .37 4.74**
General promotion focus t1 .59 6.34** .20 2.17*
R2 .28 .21
F 23.50** 15.80**
Note. * p < .05; ** p < .01