Abstract: Creative potential is a cognitive potential reflecting to which degree an individual can generate novel and useful things and ideas. The early development of creative potential is shaped by parenting behaviors and incubated in parent-child relationships. However, little research has examined specifically how this development occurs during the preschool years in Chinese children and how parental verbal comments related to a child's mental states (i.e., mind-mindedness) are predictive of this development. Thus, the first aim of the current study is to examine whether maternal mind-mindedness in toddlerhood predicts child creative potential during the preschool period. Moreover, as in toddlerhood mothers give comments on various mental states of a child (e.g., desire, cognition, and emotion) with different frequencies, we surmise that young children might have different levels of need for those maternal verbal inputs. In turn, those comments may exhibit different developmental relevance to children's cognitive outcomes including creative potential. Therefore, the second aim is to examine whether maternal comments on desire, cognition, and emotion might potentially differentially predict child creative potential overtime. Furthermore, previous studies have shown that the influences of early parenting behaviors are relationship-dependent to some extent, further suggesting that how maternal mind-mindedness and its corresponding components foretell child later creative potential may be different for mother-child dyads with varying levels of attachment security. Therefore, the third aim of this study is to examine whether mother-child attachment security might moderate the longitudinal association between maternal mind-mindedness (or the comments on cognition, desire, and emotion) and child creative potential. Drawing from 92 children and their families (boys = 39, girls = 53), we coded mother-child attachment security in the Strange Situation task at 14 months. At 25 months, maternal mind-mindedness and its components including comments on desire, cognition, and emotion were observed in three 5-min free-plays. At 61 months, child creative potential was assessed by the Thinking Creativity in Action and Movement Test. Results were found that maternal mind-mindedness at 25 months was positively associated with child creative potential at 61 months. This association was further moderated by 14-month attachment security, showing that for children who were relatively securely attached to the mother, no association was found, whereas for children who were insecurely attached, maternal mind-mindedness was positively associated with child creative potential. Although the three specific components of mind-mindedness were not directly related to child creative potential, similar moderations of 14-month attachment security were found for comments on desire and comments on cognition, indicating that for children who were insecurely attached, maternal comments on desire or cognition could scaffold their later creative potential, whereas such scaffolding of maternal mental state comments were less effective for children who were securely attached. Taken together, the current findings suggest that maternal mind-mindedness could facilitate child later creative potential in early childhood, yet the strength of this positive association depends on the security of mother-child attachment. Therefore, our research is informative for future interventions and education programs. It is possible that young children with poorer parent-child relationships could benefit more from the verbal inputs of parents than their peers for having their creative potential facilitated.

Key words: maternal mind‐mindedness, attachment,, creative potential,, moderation

摘要： 本研究考察学步儿期母亲将心比心和亲子依恋安全性与学龄前儿童创造力潜能的关系。参与者为92个家庭，儿童14个月时编码亲子依恋安全性，24个月时编码母亲将心比心，61个月时考察儿童创造力潜能。结果发现，将心比心与创造力潜能正相关；依恋安全性调节将心比心及愿望和认知状态评论与创造力潜能的相关，正相关关系仅出现在依恋安全性较低的亲子对。故本研究提出母亲将心比心对提升依恋安全性较低儿童的创造力潜能有更突出的作用。

关键词: 母亲将心比心, 依恋, 创造力潜能, 调节作用