ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Organizational Psychology
The concept, dimensions, and measurement of innovative competitive behavior in Chinese scientific and technological personnel
Provisionally accepted
- 1School of Public Administration, Beihang University, Beijing, China
- 2Institute of Scientific Technological Strategic Consultation, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Beijing, Beijing, China
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While competitive behavior in innovation activities is increasingly prevalent in practice and actively promoted by policymakers, it remains an under-explored area in academic research. To bridge this gap, we introduce the concept of "innovative competitive behavior," providing a conceptual definition and clarifying its theoretical boundaries, rooted in social comparison theory from psychology. A mixed-methods approach was employed to systematically examine this construct. The qualitative phase, guided by grounded theory, identified two core dimensions: competitive behavior in innovation input, including competition in acquiring, allocating, and utilizing innovation resources, and competitive behavior in innovative output, involving competition in quantity, quality, and innovation outcomes. These dimensions form the foundation of the Four-Degree Diamond Model of innovative competitive behavior proposed in this study. In the quantitative phase, we developed and validated a 13-item psychological scale through questionnaire surveys and factor analysis to reliably measure the construct. The scale used in this research possesses satisfactory reliability and validity. By integrating innovation theory and competition theory at the micro-level, this research contributes to the emerging field of individual-level innovative competition and lays a groundwork for its theoretical development. These findings offer a roadmap for policymakers and corporate managers to effectively incentivize scientific and technological personnel, thereby enhancing innovation performance through innovative competition.
Keywords: Innovative competitive behavior, innovation, competition, grounded theory, scale development
Received: 16 Jun 2024; Accepted: 28 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Ping, Weihua, Rui and Guannan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Li Rui, lapple0714@163.com
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