Moderating effect of the urbanicity construct on teachers' capacities to foster children's creativity in rural areas: evidence from Southwest China

While the Chinese government is in full force to narrow the gap between its rural and urban areas in all facets of development, it has been suggested that there are disparities in teacher quality in the two dichotomous territories, especially in terms of promoting children's cognitive trajectory. To unpack specifically the differences of the two groups of teachers' capacities to foster children's creativity, this study investigated the impact, namely the moderating effect, of the urbanicity construct (i.e., in terms of the extent of urbanization of the teachers' living and working environment) on the relationship between teachers' perceived creativity characteristics of children and teachers' intention of creativity fostering teaching. Such was done through comparing the teachers' perception of creative characteristics (teachers' CC), vis-a-vis teachers' intention of creativity fostering teaching (teachers' CFT intention). In total, 104 teachers from two parts of Guizhou province participated in the study. Results showed that teachers' CC positively associated with CFT intention. However, urbanicity did not directly associate with teachers' CC and CFT. Instead, higher urbanicity decreased the association between teachers' CC and CFT intention. Implications and the significance of these findings will be discussed.