The Influence of Time Pressure on Creativity: Exploring the Effects of Achievement Anxiety and Gender

This study aims to investigate the influence of time pressure on creativity, considering the mediating effect of achievement anxiety and the potential moderating role of gender. The participants included 158 university students from K City. Data analysis involved the use of SPSS 22.0 and PROCESS Macro to examine both the mediating effect and moderated mediating effect. The findings revealed several key insights. Firstly, among the factors of achievement anxiety, facilitation anxiety was found to mediate the relationship between time pressure and creativity. However, gender did not demonstrate a moderating effect in this context. Secondly, disturbance anxiety did not mediate the relationship between time pressure and creativity, and gender did not exhibit a moderating role. Lastly, the combined model incorporating achievement anxiety demonstrated significant main effects of time pressure on both creativity and achievement anxiety. Higher levels of perceived time pressure were associated with increased achievement anxiety, ultimately leading to improved creativity. However, no significant gender-specific effects were observed, except for facilitation anxiety. This suggests that when performing creative tasks, time pressure and facilitation anxiety can increase creative potential by providing challenges and opportunities. Therefore, in creative education, it is implied that not only cognitive skills but also the individual characteristics and psychological environment of learners should be carefully considered.