Structural Modeling of Risky Behaviors According to Cerebral-Behavioral Systems and the Dark Triad of Personality with the Mediation of Emotional Creativity in Secondary high School Students

The purpose of the present study was the structural modeling of risky behaviors according to cerebral-behavioral systems and the dark triad of personality with the mediation of emotional creativity in secondary high school students. The research method was correlational through structural equation modeling and the research population was composed of all secondary high school students in Shahin Shahr in academic year 2020-21 from whom 550 students who had participated voluntarily were selected through available sampling method and they were asked to answer the items of the questionnaires. 505 of the answer sheets were then returned completely. The research instruments included cerebral-behavioral questionnaires (Carver and White, 1994), risky behaviors, dark personality and emotional creativity (Averill, 1999). The data analysis was conducted through Pearson correlation methods and structural equation modeling via SPSS and Amos software versions 23. The results showed that the results of behavioral activation and inhibition systems, dark triad of personality (narcissism, Machiavellianism and anti-socialism) had a significant direct effect on students' emotional creativity and high-risk behaviors (p<0.001). in addition the results also showed that the emotional creativity, to having a direct effect on students' high-risk behaviors, also has a significant mediating role in the relationship between brain-behavioral systems and dark triad of personality with high-risk behaviors in high school students. Considering the significant mediation role of emotional creativity, it is suggested to try to decrease the emergence of risky behaviors through influencing cerebral-behavioral systems and dark aspects of behavior via teaching emotion regulation skills and emotional creativity.