Self-talk valence and motivational orientation for entrepreneurship: an exploratory study

Abstract

ABSTRACT Self-talk is a well-researched component of self-efficacy that is frequently used as a motivational tool in sports. This study investigated how self-talk, as a component of entrepreneurship self-efficacy, relates to entrepreneurial motivation orientation. An online survey measured the self-talk valence of twenty-four entrepreneurs. Subsequently, interviews were conducted with the same entrepreneurs to collect narratives of their entrepreneurship start-up. The interview data were thematically coded and analysed. Links between the entrepreneurship motivation and the entrepreneurs’ net self-talk valence scores were plotted. The analysis suggests that those with positive self-talk typically had intrinsic motivation orientations, while those with negative scores had shared extrinsic motivational orientations. Contrary to the association of positive self-talk with motivation in sports, counterintuitively, negative self-talk’s link with motivation presents a novel finding. This finding is explained using the ‘push’ and ‘pull’ theories of entrepreneurial motivation. The study recommends deductive testing for this inductively explored relationship.