Fostering Change in Entrepreneurial Intention: Experimental evaluation of an intervention based on career choice factors

Abstract

Entrepreneurship is of increasing importance in today’s economy and society. As a result, government and policy makers are making a call to encourage venture creation. One of the common ways in which entrepreneurship is encouraged is through interventions that provide people with information about entrepreneurship. Such information, as offered in high school or university courses or programs, is seen as a means to foster entrepreneurial intention—that is, individuals' desire to pursue entrepreneurship as a career. However, among existing studies on the topic, there is a lack of an internally valid evaluation of the impact of such interventions for increasing entrepreneurial intention and a lack of a relevant theoretical basis for any such impact. Accordingly, we provide an evaluation of an entrepreneurship intervention through a lab experiment that draws directly on established theories in career choice. Our findings reveal that exposing participants to information about entrepreneurship can in fact increase entrepreneurial intention. This increase was found to occur mainly through a process of learning about how entrepreneurship can promote one’s identity.