The malleability of international entrepreneurial cognitions: a natural quasi-experimental study on voluntary and involuntary shocks
International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research
ISSN: 1355-2554
Article publication date: 11 January 2022
Issue publication date: 29 March 2022
Abstract
Purpose
The authors investigate the durability of international entrepreneurial cognitions. Specifically, they examine how advanced business education and the Covid-19 pandemic influence international entrepreneurial orientation disposition (IEOD), and subsequently entrepreneurial intentions (EIs), to better understand the psychological dynamics underpinning the drivers of international entrepreneurship.
Design/methodology/approach
Against the backdrop of emerging entrepreneurial cognition and international entrepreneurial orientation research, the authors theorize that both a planned business education intervention (voluntary) and an unforeseeable radical environmental (involuntary) change constitute cognitive shocks impacting the disposition and intention to engage in entrepreneurial efforts. The authors use pre- and post-Covid-19 panel data (n = 233) and uniquely identify the idiosyncratic cognitive effects of Covid-19 through changes in the OCEAN personality assessment.
Findings
Findings demonstrate that when individuals' perceived psychological impact of Covid-19 is low, business education increases IEOD. Conversely, the effects of a strongly perceived Covid-19 impact reduce the risk-taking and proactiveness components of the IEOD scale. The authors trace the same effects forward to EIs.
Research limitations/implications
This paper contributes to a greater understanding of the resilience of entrepreneurial dispositions through an empirical test of the IEOD scale and shows its boundary conditions under planned intervention as well as unplanned externally induced shock.
Practical implications
The study offers a first benchmark to practitioners of the malleability of international entrepreneurial dispositions and discusses the potential to encourage international entrepreneurial behaviour and the individual-level dispositional risk posed by exogenous shocks.
Originality/value
The study uniquely employs a baseline measure of all our constructs pre-Covid-19 to discern and isolate the pandemic impact on entrepreneurial dispositions and intentions, responding to recent calls for more experimental designs in entrepreneurship research.
Keywords
Citation
Clark, D.R., Pidduck, R.J. and Tietz, M.A. (2022), "The malleability of international entrepreneurial cognitions: a natural quasi-experimental study on voluntary and involuntary shocks", International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, Vol. 28 No. 3, pp. 741-766. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEBR-08-2021-0639
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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