Prosocial Motivation as a Double-Edged Sword on Creativity

The current research develops the theoretical account of how prosocial motivation relates to creativity and how prosocial impact of task affects this relationship. I theorize that prosocial motivation has conflicting influences on employee creativity such that it bolsters the usefulness but hinders the novelty dimension of creativity. In an effort to search for a way of increasing prosocial employees’ creativity, I investigate the roles of prosocial impact of task. Specifically, I hypothesize that prosocial employees are likely to show higher levels of creativity when they work on tasks that can benefit others. This is because such tasks meet the needs of prosocial employees and thus increase their intrinsic motivation on the tasks, which then complements the weakness of prosocial employees (i.e., novelty). A mix of three laboratory and quasi-field experiments supported the hypotheses. Study 1 (a laboratory experiment) showed that prosocial motivation increases usefulness while decreasing novelty of ideas. Study 2 (a quasi-field experiment) found that prosocial impact of task enables prosocial individuals to be creative in idea generation by increasing not only novelty but also usefulness. Study 3 (a quasi-field experiment) showed that intrinsic motivation mediates the interactive effects that prosocial motivation and prosocial impact of task have on creativity. Theoretical and practical implications, as well as directions for future research, are discussed.