Hi, I'm doing a research for my master study. And I was exploring the mediation effect with 5 IVS, one mediator(Unlearni), one DV(creativity). And one of the IVs(PM) failed to be mediated by mediator.

However, in return, this PM can be a mediator to mediate the relationship between the previous mediator(Unlearni) and DV. It seems that the casual relationship was reversed. what might be the reasons cause this confusion? For example, might be the problem that the theoretical support is not rational enough? I was always confusing that how to judge one variable should be a meditor or a moderator, sometimes by using simply looking for the literature to judge the causal relationship can be confusing.

And I also did moderation anlaysis. The result by using PROCESS is showed in the following picture. It looked like PM could also be a moderator between previous mediator(Unlearni) and DV(creativity).

Will this be a big mistake that the model be so messy now?

Thank you so much for all kindly providing comments! Thanks in advance.