Are interactions between need for achievement and social networks the driving force behind entrepreneurial Intention? A trait activation story

Abstract

Entrepreneurial intention plays a key role in entrepreneurship. Over the years, scholars have explained it using personality traits, cognitive models and, to a lesser extent, the role of social environment. Since this role has been underestimated, we build on trait activation theory to explore how social networks are especially relevant and can trigger the activation of individuals’ need for achievement to predict entrepreneurial intention. We test our hypotheses on a sample of 597 university students from Spain using partial least squares (PLS). Our results confirm that social network size positively influences the entrepreneurial information obtained in social networks, which in turn, positively impacts entrepreneurial intention. Additionally, we found that need for achievement is activated in the context of social networks, enhancing the influence of this information on entrepreneurial intention. Through fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), we also identify alternative configurations of the previous variables that lead to greater entrepreneurial intention.