Resources for creative development: introducing the QELC-Creativity

Supporting creative development requires attention to the resources students can draw on. The QELC-Creativity adapts the Questionnaire of Educational and Learning Capital (QELC) to assess resources relevant to creative development. It brings students’ perceptions of resources within the person and in the environment into a common framework. We examined the 40-item instrument in nonprobability samples from Ukraine, Greece, China, Sudan, and Pakistan, with 6,967 students retained after screening. An extended two-factor model of educational and learning capital was developed from capital-scale scores in one Ukrainian subsample and tested unchanged in the other. The factor loadings could be held equal across countries with little change in fit. This supported approximate metric invariance. Model fit itself was more uneven: some indices were favorable, others less so. Full scalar invariance was not supported. The exploratory partial scalar model met our fit-change criteria. These findings extend the application of educational and learning capital to a further developmental domain and provide an initial international basis for resource-focused creativity research. The instrument gives researchers a shared way to investigate how students’ personal resources and educational opportunities relate to creative engagement. It also brings into view conditions that educational efforts to foster creativity can seek to improve.