Gender, Personal Traits, and Entrepreneurial Intentions

Abstract

Gender differences in entrepreneurial intentions and agentic traits frequently linked to entrepreneurship (locus of control, entrepreneurial self-efficacy, risk-taking propensity, and proactiveness) were examined using a sample of 535 women and 283 men, all of them university students. Self-report data were collected through a questionnaire consisting of several scales. MANOVA results showed gender differences in entrepreneurial intention and entrepreneurial self-efficacy, men feeling more efficient to create a new venture and being more prone to do so than women. Nevertheless, major area and age explained differences in the variables studied better than gender. All this evidence supports the idea that the lower entrepreneurial activity observed in women refers not only to the verifiable creation of a new business, but that it extends to the first phase relating to career choice and the formation of intentions in this respect. This raises the need to approach the problem of scarce entrepreneurial initiatives in women from the very early stages of career choice, when the person is still weighing the different job alternatives and making decisions about them.