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Given the critical mass of literature on entrepreneurial risk-taking, the purpose of this paper is to assess the contribution to the knowledge so far by exploring important themes in the literature on entrepreneurial risk-taking.

The review is organized around four themes: nature of entrepreneurial risk-taking; antecedents of entrepreneurial risk-taking; context of entrepreneurial risk-taking; and outcomes of entrepreneurial risk-taking. The author critically evaluates the literature on each theme and presents the pointers for future research.

Literature does provide a holistic view encapsulating different dimensions of entrepreneurial risk-taking, but it has produced largely inconsistent findings in terms of risk and gender, risk propensity of entrepreneurs in comparison to non-entrepreneurs and the outcomes of entrepreneurial risk-taking. Organizational antecedents, non-financial measures and ethical- and health-related consequences of entrepreneurial risk are underexplored. Inconclusive literature also implies that the risk may not be a distinguishing or important factor for undertaking an entrepreneurial endeavor. Therefore, it is pertinent to explore the critical factors entrepreneurs consider (or not consider) while marshalling their resources to embark on an entrepreneurial journey. This posits the need to explore an entrepreneur’s informal approach toward risk-taking.

Suggested pointers of future research will potentially enhance the theoretical understanding of entrepreneurial risk-taking.

This longitudinal study assesses whether higher education has the same impact on the entrepreneurial intentions of women and men with regard to their propensity to risk-taking in particular.

A self-administrated survey instrument was used to collect data from students studying business and engineering at five selected universities in Turkey. The survey was carried out in two intervals: first year and fourth year of studies. A total of 215 student participated in both waves.

The findings indicate that the impact of education is stronger for women than for men as the relationship between gender and entrepreneurial intention is moderated by education and risk-taking propensity in that the entrepreneurial intention of women with high or low risk-taking propensity increases when they acquire higher education. In particular, the boost is more noticeable for women with low risk-taking propensity. On the contrary, the effect of education is negative for men with both high risk-taking propensity and low risk-taking propensity.

This study has identified that the impact of education is different for women and men. Based on these findings, Turkey could offer gender-specific entrepreneurship education in higher education for individuals who could then exploit their entrepreneurial capacity and thus contribute to the social and economic well-being of the country.

This paper makes two distinct contributions. First, this is one of the few longitudinal studies in the literature which demonstrates the differences between females and males in terms of their entrepreneurial intention and shows how risk-taking and education influence entrepreneurial intention. Second, it offers new insights into entrepreneurship research from a developing-country but emerging-economy context.

Drawing on organizational identity theory, we develop a model linking family ownership and expectations, entrepreneurial risk taking, and image in family firms to explain family firm growth. Testing our model on a sample of 163 Swiss family firms, we suggest that entrepreneurial risk taking and image can both lead to growth in family firms. We further find that family expectations have an influence on both entrepreneurial risk taking and family firm image. This finding suggests that family firms may benefit from two growth paths – forward looking risk taking and the image of the family firm that builds on the past, and that these paths are nurtured by family expectations.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically explore the impact of culture (using individualism, power distance and uncertainty avoidance) on entrepreneurial risk taking behavior which leads to the opportunity exploitation decision. Moreover, it also uses risk taking behavior of entrepreneurial as the mediation variable between culture and opportunity exploitations decisions.

The study took place in Tanzania, which is allocated in East Africa and is one of under researched countries. In total, 140 entrepreneurs who own venture of 5-99 employees were able to be interviewed using a survey questionnaire. In this study, structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to examine the direct and indirect relationship of culture in entrepreneurial opportunity exploitation decisions.

After hypothesis testing, the empirical results showed that Tanzania’s culture has an impact on entrepreneurial risk taking behavior, which influences entrepreneurial opportunity exploitation decision. It also showed culture through individualism and uncertainty avoidance measurements affect entrepreneurial opportunity exploitation decisions. The empirical results on power distance were insignificant.

This study is a wake-up call to policy makers and formal institutions such as government authorities, education institutions and religion institutions. Thus, culture has an ability to influence the behavior of entrepreneurs and so the performance of ventures if it is consistent and well structured. Therefore it should be not taken for granted. Data for our study are based on only two cities and therefore the results should not be generalized as the whole country’s inference. Generalizability is questioned because the data are from only two cities in Tanzania and therefore future research should include more cities to be able to validate the generalizability.

This study is a wake-up call to policymakers and formal institutions such as government authorities, education institutions and religion institutions. Thus culture has an ability to influence the behavior of entrepreneurs and so the performance of ventures if it is consistent and well structured. Therefore it should be not taken for granted. Data for our study are based on only two cities and therefore the results should not be generalized as the whole country’s inference.

In the country which has well-structured culture, influence the behavior of entrepreneurs to exploit opportunities.

This is the first empirical study to use SEM for exploring the culture of individualism, power distance and uncertainty avoidance impact on entrepreneurial opportunity exploitation in Tanzania.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the impact of entrepreneurial thinking systems on risk‐taking propensity and entrepreneurial behavior.

The research was conducted using an original data set of 231 entrepreneurs in China. The data were analyzed through regressing models.

It is found that, in China, the experiential system has a positive impact on risk‐taking propensity yet a negative impact on entrepreneurial behavior; however, the rational system has a negative impact on risk‐taking propensity yet a positive impact on entrepreneurial behavior.

This paper focuses on entrepreneurs in a specific geographical region, China. Despite the hypothesis, the impact of thinking systems on entrepreneurial behavior highlights the importance of the rational system.

Research of entrepreneurs by foreign scholars has focused on the risk‐perception perspective, and the only national research is based on the authors' subjective experience and lacks an empirical basis. Based on Western theory, this paper empirically studies the impact of entrepreneurial thinking systems on risk‐taking propensity and entrepreneurial behavior in China.

The theme of this paper is entrepreneurial risk taking. Specifically, the paper has twofold objectives: to develop insights into individual and familial correlates of risk‐taking propensity in family firms; to explore impacts of risk taking on business performance.

A quantitative survey was conducted with the sampling frame outlined based on the FAME database. A total of 236 companies participated in this survey.

The results suggest that individual and familial variables will determine the risk‐taking propensity, specifically entrepreneur's industrial tenure, age, and the controlling generation in family businesses. Furthermore, risk‐taking intensity correlates with business performance.

The cross‐sectional rather than longitudinal design of the study determines that it can only proffer a snapshot of the scenario. Further, the current study excludes non‐incorporated firms. Future explorative studies in a similar vein may be executed through channels of national and local development agencies to capture non‐incorporated firms.

Recent recognition of the intertwinement of family and business in family firms has led to the assumption that risk‐taking propensity in family firms is influenced by family ownership and family associated concerns. Nonetheless, rarely has the influence of family on risk‐taking propensity and the ensuing performance been addressed in the literature. The insights developed by this original exploration will broaden the knowledge landscape of family firms and entrepreneurial venturing allowing us to better understand how family firms can survive and prosper in the increasingly competitive market.

This study aims to analyze the effect of entrepreneurs’ improvisational behavior on business risk-taking and opportunity recognition, as well as to analyze its subsequent impact on firm performance. Moreover, this study examined whether the effect of entrepreneurs’ improvisational behavior on business risk-taking and opportunity recognition could be moderated by firm size and the business experience of entrepreneurs.

Online survey data were collected from 304 firms in Thailand that were randomly selected from a business directory. The data were assessed using partial least squares structural modeling.

The results confirmed that entrepreneurs who exhibited high levels of improvisational behavior tended to report that their firms engaged more actively in risk-taking and opportunity recognition. Moreover, risk-taking and opportunity recognition played a chain mediating effect in explaining the association between the improvisational behavior of entrepreneurs and firm performance. Regarding the moderating effects, this paper found that firm size negatively moderated the effect of improvisational behavior on risk-taking and opportunity recognition, while business experience of entrepreneurs only positively moderated the effect of improvisational behavior on risk-taking.

This study provided new knowledge by showing that improvisational behavior of entrepreneurs should be integrated with other firm advantages determined by firm size and the business experience of entrepreneurs to strengthen the ability to be more effective at risk-taking and opportunity recognition.

This paper aims to examine the determinants of entrepreneurial intention among students of a university in Nigeria, with particular emphasis on their risk-taking propensity, social support and demographic variables.

Data for the study were collected from 350 undergraduates across seven faculties in Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria, through a self-reported questionnaire. Descriptive and regression statistical analysis were used to estimate and test the relationship among entrepreneurial intention and social support, risk-taking propensity and demographic variables.

The results showed high entrepreneurial intention among the students. The push factors, such as perceived social support from families, risk-taking propensity and previous engagement in business, are key determinants of entrepreneurship intention among the students. The age and father’s occupation also showed a significant relationship with the level of entrepreneurial intention.

This result suggests that strengthening social support for entrepreneurship among students could enhance their desire to own a business during and after graduation. Improving entrepreneurship ecosystems in the university could further motivate those already practicing entrepreneurship while also stimulating intentions among others. For instance, provision of entrepreneurship infrastructure and incentives such as business incubators, innovation hubs, science parks and competitive business grants could enhance the risk-taking propensity among students and motivate them for venture creation.

Understanding the influence of social support and risk-taking propensity on entrepreneurial intention among undergraduates is important for policy and practice. The result further reinforces the need to promote entrepreneurship education to create a critical mass of potential entrepreneurs in the university.

This paper aims to further our understanding of the career success of the self-employed and how it is influenced by their psychological capital (PC), persistence (P) and risk-taking propensity (RTP). This study explores the direct effect of PC on success and investigates the potential mediation of P and RTP on the PC-success association.

In this quantitative study, questionnaires were administered to measure PC, P, risk-taking and success. Data was collected using purposive sampling with an expert judgment that represented a cross-section of the entrepreneurial population in three Malaysian northern states. Structural equation modeling by means of partial least square was used for hypotheses testing of the 252 usable responses.

Statistically significant and positive relationships were found between PC and success, whereas P and risk-taking were found to mediate the PC-success association. The mediation effects of P and risk-taking were more pronounced when entrepreneurial self-efficacy and optimism were included in the PC as a second-order construct than individually separate constructs.

The importance of the transitional progression of self-efficacy and optimism to success through P and risk-taking were verified and so can be used for nurturing efforts that activate positive self-efficacy and optimism for entrepreneurial career success. The lower mediation effect of risk-taking on the optimism-success association denotes caution when managing risk.

There is a relative dearth of supporting research that has not examined the inter-relationships between PC and career success of entrepreneurs. Exploring the intervening effect of P and risk-taking on that relationship is unprecedented.

Research shows that innovation is imperative for business competitiveness and that entrepreneurs are stimulators of innovation. This is particularly true for younger entrepreneurs, who are recognized as having technological savvy, high dependency on the web, low fear of change and high zeal for challenges. However, not all businesses headed by younger entrepreneurs innovate, and research on younger entrepreneurs' innovation is lacking. This study assessed the main drivers of innovation in a sample of young Canadian entrepreneurs leading businesses in the initiation phase.

A sample of young Canadian entrepreneurs leading businesses in the initiation phase has been employed. This study is based on younger entrepreneurs and draws on the definition of generations Y and Z (Taylor and Keeter, 2010). It examines the initial stage of a business, up to 3 years. The sample includes 100 adults (65% female), whose ages ranged from 18 to 34 years. The drivers to innovate included external support (e.g. mentoring, funds, accelerators) and internal factors, including psychological attributes (i.e. risk-taking) and entrepreneurial motivations. Regression and structural equation modeling analyses have been conducted.

The findings revealed that entrepreneurial motivations for achieving self-fulfillment and contributing to the world, which are prevalent among younger generations, fostered innovation both directly and indirectly through the mediating effect of external support and risk-taking. External support fostered innovation not directly but through the mediating effect of risk-taking; in contrast, internal factors directly propelled innovation. This finding demonstrates the significance younger generations attribute to internal factors over external factors in the quest for innovation.

This study can be an intriguing starting point for future studies to examine in more depth the intertwined role of external and internal factors in accelerating innovation among younger entrepreneurs. Studies could examine various psychological attributes and professional and business capabilities (Zahra, 2021) as well as external factors.

Our findings add to this literature in stressing the need to strengthen risk-taking among younger entrepreneurs, which is affected by external support and produces innovation; and reinforce the relevance of the resource-based view in revealing younger entrepreneurs' avenues to develop innovation, pinpointing external support as contingent on motivation and demonstrating the role of risk-taking in the pursuit of innovation.