Does creativity breed unethical behavior? The roles of novelty and appropriateness in unethical behavior

Abstract

Although researchers posit that creativity leads to more unethical behavior, findings have been mixed. The inconsistency may stem from previous studies prioritizing novelty over appropriateness. The goal of this study was to investigate the potential associations between novelty and appropriateness in creativity and children's inclinations towards implicit and explicit unethical behavior. Primary school children (N = 263, Mage = 11.25; 44.5 % girls) completed the alternative uses task (AUT) measuring their creativity and questionnaires measuring their unethical behavior tendency. Results showed that novelty was positively correlated with unethical behavior, while appropriateness was negatively correlated with unethical behavior. Most importantly, appropriateness moderated the relationship between novelty and children's unethical behavior. The current findings improve the understanding of the association between creativity and unethical behavior and its underlying mechanism. It demonstrates that novelty and appropriateness play different roles in unethical behavior. Further, these results can inspire methods to cultivate creativity in educational environments and daily life.