A Study On The Effect Of Follower-leader Attachment Relationship On Employee Creativity

In an environment of rapid development and change,intense competition and technological upgrades,more and more organizations and managers are realizing the importance of motivating employees to devote themselves to creative work.Since leaders are an important figure in employees' social network in the workplace,their behavior and the leader-follower relationship play a crucial role in stimulating employees' creativity.From an attachment theory perspective,this dissertation takes Chinese corporation employees as a sample and adopts an empirical method to explore the mechanisms and boundary conditions of the effect of follower-leader attachment relationships on employees' creativity,thereby not only complementing previous research,but also helping to offer some management implications for organizations.First of all,the literature and theories relating to follower-leader attachment relationship and creativity were reviewed and summarized.The first chapter of the dissertation introduces attachment theory and the research into its application in the organizational context,including the core content of attachment theory and studies on the influence of attachment on leadership and on employees' emotions and behaviors.The second chapter contains a comprehensive description of leader-follower attachment relationship,including its concept,influential factors,effects and mechanisms.The third chapter summarizes progress in the research on creativity,including the concept,theories and influential factors of creativity in the workplace,along with the influence of the leader-follower relation on creativity.The fourth chapter contains an analysis of the relationship between attachment and creativity,a presentation of related empirical research,and a discussion of the gaps in the current research and prospective future directions for research.Based on a review of the literature,four empirical studies were conducted.In the first study,an attachment scale with three dimensions was developed from the concept of attachment following a comparison of different attachment measuring tools and theories.Two surveys were conducted to develop this scale.The first survey was implemented through a network with a sample of 297 adults.The formal survey was carried out with a sample of 328 employees.Following the steps of scale development,the reliability and validity were confirmed.The results showed the good fitness of the three dimensional design.The second study explored the influence of follower-leader secure attachment on employees' creativity.Data were collected from 263 employees and their direct leaders and analyzed using hierarchical regression analysis.The results revealed that follower-leader secure attachment had a significant positive effect on followers' creativity.Individuals' harmonious passion moderated this effect;secure attachment had a stronger impact on followers' creativity when environmental uncertainty was higher.Additionally,the moderating effect of environmental uncertainty was mediated by harmonious passion.In the third study,based on attachment theory and the Dual Path Creative Model,the effect of follower-leader insecure attachment was investigated.Data was collected at three different time points with 315 dyads of employees and their direct leader.The research revealed an inverted U-shaped effect of follower-leader anxious attachment on employee creativity,and a negative influence from follower-leader avoidance attachment.Creative involvement mediated the above relationships.And creative requirements moderated these two effects.Specifically,under the condition of high creative requirement,moderate follower-leader anxious attachment was found to have the strongest influence on creative involvement,while the negative effect of follower-leader avoidance attachment on creative involvement became weak in such condition.The fourth study investigated,from a perspective of secure base,the moderation effect of leader secure base support(LSBS)on the relationship between follower-leader insecure attachment and creativity.The data was the same as that in study three.The results revealed that LSBS significantly moderated the influence of follower-leader insecure attachment on creativity.Creative self efficacy and intrinsic motivation mediated the above relationship.Specifically,follower-leader anxious attachment had a stronger negative effect on creativity via creativity self efficacy at lower level of LSBS.Moreover,the negative influence of follower-leader avoidant attachment on creativity via intrinsic motivation was more salient with lower LSBS.The final chapter discusses the main findings and limitations of the dissertation as well as future research directions.