Article Highlights
- Extraversion positively predicted entrepreneurial intention.
- Male college students exhibited significantly higher entrepreneurial intentions than female college students.
- Perceived social support partially mediates the relationship between extraversion and entrepreneurial intention in college students.
- The study integrates theories like the entrepreneurial event model, career choice theory, and resource dependence theory to explore these connections.
- We constructed a relationship model, emphasizing the role of perceived social support as a personal resource in shaping entrepreneurial intentions.
Due to a combination of a shortage of traditional jobs and underlying problems in the economy, college students are increasingly turning to self-employment as a solution for their employment challenges (C. Li et al., 2020). This is an important way to ease the unemployment levels of college students and is increasingly supported by governments. Studies on entrepreneurship have suggested that entrepreneurial intention is an especially important component of entrepreneurship, and it is a key predictive factor for entrepreneurial behavior (Carr & Sequeira, 2007; Wilson et al., 2007). Entrepreneurial intention refers to the belief held by individuals regarding their intention and plans to establish a company (Krueger, 2007; Tsai et al., 2016). The existence of entrepreneurial opportunities or business opportunities does not directly lead to entrepreneurial behavior because “entrepreneurial intention is behind entrepreneurial behavior” (Krueger, 2007, p. 24). Further, entrepreneurial intention is the best predictor of entrepreneurial behavior and the center of its understanding (Shirokova et al., 2016). Trivedi (2016) has shown that the entrepreneurial behaviors of college students are fundamentally affected by their entrepreneurial intentions. Individual entrepreneurial intention is a critical first step in the entrepreneurial process and the core variable for predicting the entrepreneurial behavior of university students (Dehghanpour Farashah, 2015; Krueger et al., 2000). Therefore, entrepreneurial intention is an important topic in entrepreneurship research and has become the focus of many researchers (Carr & Sequeira, 2007; Wilson et al., 2007).
Personality orientation is one of the classic research orientations in entrepreneurial research. Shapero and Sokol (1982) proposed an entrepreneurial event model specifically for the entrepreneurial field, indicating that personality traits are not only the leading variables of entrepreneurial intention but can also predict it. This is also in accordance with career choice theory (Holland, 1997). Studies on the influence of personality traits on entrepreneurial intention mainly focus on the Big Five personality traits. For example, personality traits of openness and extraversion are significantly correlated with entrepreneurial intention (Hmieleski & Baron, 2009). Zhao et al. (2010) also showed that personality characteristics are positively correlated with entrepreneurial intention.
Therefore, we used extraversion as the independent variable and perceived social support as the mediating variable to explore the important factors influencing college students’ entrepreneurial intention. We also studied the influence mechanism of extraversion on the entrepreneurial intention, to provide theoretical and empirical support for improving college students’ entrepreneurial intention.
The Relationship Between Extraversion and Entrepreneurial Intention
The Big Five personality theory has been proposed by psychologists and organizational behavior scholars (Luthans, 2002). It divides personality traits into five dimensions: neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience, conscientiousness, and agreeableness (Costa & McCrae, 1985; Norman, 1963). It states that personality includes five factors from the perspective of trait theory, which can be used to explain and predict individual behavior and psychology (X. D. Wang et al., 1999).
Regarding the relationship between extraversion and entrepreneurial intention, scholars have found that extraversion is closely related to entrepreneurial behavior (Costa & McCrae, 1985; Meng, 2020). Entrepreneurial activities are more challenging and stimulating than many other traditional occupations, and self-confidence, energy, initiative, optimism, and other personality traits are often associated with extraversion. Therefore, entrepreneurial activities are attractive to entrepreneurs with high external tendencies. Furthermore, extraversion is positively associated with entrepreneurial intention (Zhao et al., 2010). Studies have found that extraversion and openness to experience can significantly predict entrepreneurial intention (Ismail et al., 2009), and extraversion, conscientiousness, and openness are significantly correlated with entrepreneurial intention (Hmieleski & Baron, 2009; Zhao et al., 2010). Thus, the literature suggests that extraverted individuals are more likely to choose entrepreneurship and have higher entrepreneurial intention. Therefore, we proposed the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 1: Extraversion will have a significant positive predictive effect on entrepreneurial intention.
The Relationship Between Perceived Social Support and Entrepreneurial Intention
Perceived social support and received social support are two social support components that have dominated social support research over the past two decades. Received social support pertains to the actual assistance received by individuals from those around them when under pressure (Norris & Kaniasty, 1996). On the other hand, perceived social support (PSS) relates to an individual’s subjective feelings and evaluation of the extent of external support they receive (Zimet et al., 1988). PSS may be real, potential, or false, but individuals perceive it subjectively, and at times, it can help them deal with difficulties by simply sensing that someone cares and supports them (Taylor et al., 2004). These two types of support reflect an individual’s perception of support, with received social support being the support that is actually provided by others. In contrast, PSS is typically viewed as a stable characteristic that differs between individuals.
Colleges and universities support entrepreneurship in many ways, but it is important to evaluate the students’ perceptions of the support they receive to understand the extent of that support and its impact on students (Saeed et al., 2015). The perception of a supportive relationship is positively associated with the formation of entrepreneurial intentions among college students (Ambad & Damit, 2016). The buffer model theory posits that perceived social support acts as a protective mechanism that buffers the negative impact of stressors, mitigates negative emotions, and enhances coping skills (Etzion, 1984; Fried & Tiegs, 1993). Perceived social support is a trait or schema developed to cope with stress, which results in a flexible personality when an individual responds to stress (Wu et al., 2021). Studies indicate that individuals with high levels of perceived social support demonstrate an optimistic attitude towards life, actively find solutions to difficulties, and have strong coping abilities in complex environments, especially when facing high levels of pressure as experienced by entrepreneurs (Etzion, 1984; Guo et al., 2017). The empirical evidence shows that there exists a moderate correlation between perceived social support and entrepreneurial intention, with social support significantly predicting the level of entrepreneurial intention (J. H. Wang, 2016). The empirical research conducted in India by Stefańska et al. (2015) also suggests that college students’ perception of the entrepreneurial support provided by their institution significantly affects their entrepreneurial choice. Moreover, the relationship between college students’ perceived social support and their entrepreneurial intention is significant (Farooq et al., 2018). Thus, we proposed the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 2: The perception of social support will have a significant and positive predictive effect on entrepreneurial intention.
The Mediating Role of Perceived Social Support Between Extraversion and Entrepreneurial Intention
Some studies have explored the association between personality types and the level of social support that individuals receive, suggesting that extraverted college students are more likely to receive greater levels of social support than their introverted counterparts. Specifically, extraversion has been found to have a positive impact on social support, while neuroticism or psychoticism has been linked to negative influences on social support (Yu et al., 2021). Personality is recognized as an important variable that affects perceived social support in individuals (Jacobs & Holtzer, 2019). Additionally, research suggests a clear correlation between the perception of social support and specific Big Five personality traits, where neuroticism is negatively correlated and extraversion is positively correlated (Andreu-Pejó et al., 2020). Overall, individuals with high levels of extraversion are more likely to perceive higher levels of perceived social support (Swickert, 2009). Furthermore, extraversion has been linked to greater satisfaction with social relationships and a larger social network scale, which in turn may lead to higher levels of perceived social support (Lopes et al., 2003; Roberts et al., 2008). In conclusion, personality traits play an important role in the extent to which individuals perceive social support, with extraverted individuals generally better equipped to obtain social support than those who are introverted or high in neuroticism or psychoticism.
While previous studies have shown that perceived social support and extraversion are important influencing factors of entrepreneurial intention, they have focused on only two of these variables simultaneously, but no study has examined them together. That is, no empirical study has been conducted on the relationship among extraversion, perceived social support, and entrepreneurial intention. Based on the influence of extraversion on perceived social support, we proposed the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 3: Perceived social support will play a mediating role in the influence of an extraverted personality on entrepreneurial intention.
Figure 1. Hypothetical Model Diagram
Method
Participants and Procedure
Using a convenience sampling method, we selected 1,133 college students from six institutions as our participants. Among them, there were 439 men (39%) and 694 women (61%). The sample included 877 undergraduate students (77%), 190 junior college students (17%), and 66 graduate students (6%). In terms of academic disciplines, there were 290 students majoring in humanities (26%), 232 students majoring in science (20%), 188 students majoring in engineering (17%), 252 students majoring in management (22%), 107 students majoring in medicine (9%), and 64 students in other fields (6%). The participants’ ages ranged from 18 to 25 years old, with an average age of 21.58 ± 1.34 years.
Measures
Extraversion
We utilized the Chinese Big Five Personality Inventory brief version (CBF-PI-B), developed by M.-C. Wang et al. (2011). The extraverted personality section comprises eight items, which were assessed using a 6-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 6 (strongly agree). Higher scores indicate a greater degree of extraversion. Sample items include, “I enjoy participating in social and recreational gatherings.” The Cronbach’s alpha for the extraversion subscale was .84 indicating it is reliable.
Entrepreneurship Intention
The Entrepreneurial Intention Vector Scale for college students (H.-L. Li et al., 2011) has 12 items divided into two dimensions: entrepreneurial goal intention (six items) and entrepreneurial execution intention (six items). The items were evaluated using a 7-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree). Higher scores indicate a stronger entrepreneurial intention. The total score of entrepreneurial intention is obtained by summing the scores of each dimension. Sample items include, “My career goal is to become an entrepreneur” (entrepreneurial goal intention) and “I would venture into entrepreneurship when opportunities arise” (entrepreneurial execution intention). We used Mplus 7.0 for model building. The structural model of the entrepreneurial intention scale fits well, χ2/df = 4.66, root square mean error of approximation = .057, comparative fit index = .976, Tucker–Lewis index = .969, standardized root mean square residual = .033. The Cronbach’s alpha of the total scale was .94 indicating it is reliable.
Perceived Social Support
The Perceived Social Support Scale (PSSS) was created by Blumenthal et al. (1987), revised by Zimet et al. (1988), and later revised for use in China by Jiang (X. D. Wang et al., 1999). The PSSS comprises 12 items that measure subjective perceptions of social support. It comprises three dimensions: family support (four items), friend support (four items), and other support (four items), and employs a 7-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree). Higher scores indicate a greater perceived level of social support. Sample items include, “My family provides me with concrete and tangible assistance” (family support), “My friends genuinely help me” (friend support), and “When I encounter problems, there are individuals (supervisors, relatives, colleagues) who are there for me” (other support). The scale’s Cronbach’s alpha was .95 indicating the questionnaire is reliable.
Data Analysis and Processing
We used SPSS (version 22.0) and its PROCESS 3.1 macro program for data analysis. Hypothesis 3 was tested on PROCESS with 5,000 iterations to estimate the effect size of models (Hayes, 2013). Model 4 tested the mediation effect: extraversion was entered as the predictor, the perceived social support as the mediator, and entrepreneurial intention as the outcome. We included age, gender, major, subject background, and educational level in regression analyses as covariates. We conducted Harman’s single-factor test to examine common method variance before regression analysis (Johnson et al., 2011).
Results
Common Method Deviation Test
We used Harman’s single-factor test for the common method deviation test, which showed that there are five factors with eigenvalues greater than 1, and the variance explained by the first factor was 35.00%, which is less than the critical value of 40%. Therefore, it was not greatly affected by the common method deviation.
Correlation Analysis of Variables
Correlation analysis showed that extraversion was significantly positively correlated with entrepreneurial intention. There was also a significant positive correlation between perceived social support and entrepreneurial intention. See Table 1.
Table 1. Descriptive Statistics of Variables
Note. N = 1,133.
*** p < .001.
The Mediating Effect of Perceived Social Support on the Relationship Between Extraversion and Entrepreneurial Intention
To test the indirect effect of perceived social support in the relationship between extraversion and entrepreneurial intention, the bootstrap test was applied at a 95% confidence interval with 5,000 bootstrap samples. We followed the recommendations by Preacher and Hayes (2008) to calculate the confidence interval of the lower and upper bounds of bias-corrected percentile and percentile method to analyze whether the indirect effect was significant.
All continuous variables were standardized, and the mediating effect was tested with the total score of entrepreneurial intention as the dependent variable, personality as the independent variable, and perceived social support as the mediating variable. Extraversion significantly positively predicted perceived social support under the control of age, gender, major, and educational level, β = .38, p < .001. Further, the positive main effect of perceived social support on entrepreneurial intention was significant, β = .18, p < .001, thus providing support for Hypothesis 2. Extraversion positively predicted entrepreneurial intention, β = .07, p < .001, thus providing support for Hypothesis 1. Therefore, perceived social support partially mediated the relationship between college students’ extraversion and entrepreneurial intention; the mediating effect was 0.07, and after bootstrapping, the confidence interval did not contain zero [0.04–0.43], thus providing support for Hypothesis 3.
The same method analyzed the mediating effect with the two factors of entrepreneurial intention (entrepreneurial goal intention and entrepreneurial execution intention) as the dependent variables. The results showed that the partial mediating effect of perceived social support still existed, thus further supporting Hypothesis 3 (see Table 2).
Table 2. The Mediating Effect of Perceived Social Support Between Extraversion and Entrepreneurial Intention
Note. SE = standard error; CI = confidence interval, LL = lower limit, UL = upper limit.
Descriptive Statistics of Each Variable
Using the goal intention and execution intention of entrepreneurship as the dependent variables, and gender (male, female), educational level (postgraduate, undergraduate, junior college), and major (arts, science, engineering, management, medicine) as independent variables, the analysis showed that there were significant differences in entrepreneurial intentions between male and female students. There were also significant differences in educational level: the entrepreneurial intentions, and entrepreneurial goal intentions of junior college students are higher than those of undergraduate and graduate students, and their entrepreneurial execution intention is also higher, but not significantly so. There were also significant differences in entrepreneurial intention and entrepreneurial execution intention among students studying different specialties, with those in the medical specialty being the highest.
Table 3. Descriptive Statistical Analysis of Demographic Variables
Note. * p < .01. ** p < .005. *** p < .001.
In summary, extraversion significantly and positively predicted entrepreneurial intention. Thus, Hypothesis 1 was supported. The perception of social support had a significantly positive predictive effect on entrepreneurial intention. Thus Hypothesis 2 was supported. Perceived social support mediated the impact of extraversion on entrepreneurial intention. Thus, Hypothesis 3 was supported.
Discussion
Self-employment is a potential solution to alleviate the employment problem faced by college students. However, it is important to note that not all college students possess the necessary skills and characteristics to succeed as entrepreneurs. This study has identified extraversion as a key personality trait that can directly predict entrepreneurial intention, which is consistent with previous research (Y. Sun & Zhang, 2014). Specifically, students who possess extraverted personality traits perceived that they have higher social support, and a high level of perceived social support was positively correlated with entrepreneurial intention, indicating that the more socially supported an individual feels, the higher their entrepreneurial intentions are likely to be.
This research is also the first to compare the entrepreneurial intentions of junior college students and undergraduates and we found that the former group exhibits significantly higher levels of entrepreneurial intention than the latter group. This finding may be attributed to the fact that vocational education institutions place a greater emphasis on cultivating practical skills and enterprise cooperation. Finally, we have also identified medical and science students as having significantly higher levels of entrepreneurial intention than students from other majors, which is inconsistent with previous research (Hu et al., 2016).
Practical Contributions
This study is the first to investigate the association between extraversion, perceived social support, and entrepreneurial intentions, and establish a model of their relationship. Findings indicate that extraversion significantly influences entrepreneurial intentions, and this can be reinforced through family and school education to cultivate more extraverted personalities and improve entrepreneurial intentions. Perceived social support also positively impacts entrepreneurial intentions, highlighting the importance of accurately understanding individual needs, effective communication, and providing adequate support. Moreover, entrepreneurship is a social endeavor that relies on support from family, society, and individuals, rather than just the efforts of a single person.
Our study enriches the research on the factors influencing entrepreneurial intention, provides a theoretical basis for formulating policies to encourage college students’ entrepreneurial intention, and helps to explore effective ways to improve entrepreneurial intention and behavior.
Personality is affected by innate heredity and the acquired educational environment (D. Sun et al., 2020). Further, if college students feel socially supported, then their entrepreneurial intentions may increase. Therefore, increased perceived social support is achievable through more measures and policies, enacted by educational facilities. Thus, perceived social support can enhance individual entrepreneurial intention, increase employment rates, and foster more innovation and entrepreneurship achievements. Owing to the significant gender differences, it is necessary to strengthen the research on gender differences in entrepreneurship education and provide more suitable forms of entrepreneurship education and preferential policies for women.
Limitations
Overall, this study is not exhaustive and has certain limitations that may compromise its representativeness. Therefore, it is advisable to exercise caution when drawing definitive conclusions based solely on these findings.
We employed a cross-sectional research design to explore the relationship between variables. While this method can identify correlations, it cannot ascertain causality or the developmental trajectory of entrepreneurial intention. Thus, future research may benefit from longitudinal or experimental designs to provide more detailed insights into the psychological mechanisms involved.
The participants were selected from economically developed regions in China. Therefore, increasing the sample size and selecting participants from other areas may enhance the external validity of the research conclusions.
In brief, further and ongoing research is required to investigate the immediate and longitudinal impact of entrepreneurial training using new, larger, and more diverse samples. Future work with larger samples would provide helpful information on the impact of social variables such as gender and age on the relationship between entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial intentions, especially at early ages.
Future Research Directions
This research is based on responses from participants in a Chinese cultural background. To promote cross-cultural communication and understanding, more studies on entrepreneurial intentions in different cultural contexts should be conducted in the future. Entrepreneurship intentions will change with age (Hatak et al., 2015). Vertical research can explore the changes in entrepreneurial intentions at different ages, the optimal time to start a business, and how to conduct entrepreneurship education to achieve better results.
There have always been large gender differences in the entrepreneurial process (Gupta et al., 2008; H. Li et al., 2013). Therefore, future research should focus more on how to improve women’s entrepreneurial intentions to allow them to demonstrate entrepreneurial behavior. Finally, entrepreneurship can only occur when the entrepreneurial intention is transformed into entrepreneurial behavior (H. Li et al., 2020). Therefore, future research should explore how to better transform entrepreneurial intentions into actionable entrepreneurial behaviors.
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