Entrepreneurial Intentions among University Students: Testing a Model of Entrepreneurial Intention

Abstract

New business creation is a volitional behavior that is intentional in nature. There is a growing body of literature arguing that intentions play a very relevant role in the decision to start a new firm. Since education can influence young people’s attitudes and aspirations toward entrepreneurship, there is a need to understand how to develop and nurture potential entrepreneurs during their university years. Researchers have suggested that intention models offer a significant opportunity toward better understanding and prediction of entrepreneurial activities. Therefore, this study uses an intention model, the theory of planned behavior (TPB), to study the entrepreneurial intentions of 120 B. Com. undergraduate students the university of Kelaniya. Thus, the study was conducted to address the current gap in entrepreneurship research by answering the following research questions: (1) what is the level of entrepreneurial intention among university students. (2) What are the predictors of entrepreneurial intention among university students? Moreover, it has tried to test the applicability of the entrepreneurial intention model. A survey questionnaire was employed to collect data and both descriptive statistics and inferential statistics were applied through SPSS 14 version to analyze the data. The study concludes that entrepreneurial intention can be predicted significantly by personal attractiveness and perceived feasibility. Social norms were found to be non-significant. In terms of theoretical contribution, this study suggests that the theory of planned behavior is very useful, and it provides a sound theoretical framework toward understanding the antecedents of entrepreneurial intentions.