Curious enough to start up? How epistemic curiosity and entrepreneurial alertness influence entrepreneurship orientation and intention

Abstract

Epistemic curiosity as the desire to acquire new knowledge and ideas is considered as an important attribute for successful entrepreneurs among practitioners, yet there is lacking empirical evidence of epistemic curiosity having an effect on entrepreneurial outcomes. This study aims to put a spotlight on epistemic curiosity as a predictor for entrepreneurial intentions and orientation. We found that epistemic curiosity has a stronger influence on entrepreneurial outcomes in comparison to the Big Five personality trait openness to experience, which is a widely used and conceptually related predictor for entrepreneurship. Furthermore, we found evidence for a mediating role of entrepreneurial alertness which gives further insights about how personality influences the ability to recognize business opportunities and leads to the formation of entrepreneurship orientation and intentions. Our findings contribute to the field of entrepreneurship research by emphasizing that epistemic curiosity may be one of the most important personality indicators for the emergence of entrepreneurial intentions and behavior.

Psychological and sociological determinants of entrepreneurial intentions and behaviors

“…The research is limited to the personality characteristics of persons and the sociological entrepreneurial background as an important set of factors that can contribute to the establishment of companies. Other factors that might be important for the setting up of companies (e.g., innovativeness, Alshebami and Seraj, 2022 ; creativity, Peljko and Auer Antončič, 2022 ; narcissism and resilience, Leonelli et al, 2022 ; improvisation, Guo et al, 2022 ; emotional intelligence, Lopez-Nunez et al, 2022 ; epistemic curiosity and entrepreneurial alertness, Heinemann et al, 2022 ; financial rewards and social recognition, Ismail, 2022 ; theory of planned behavior components: personal attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control, Maheshwari, 2021 ) were not included in the research and can be added in future studies.…”

Antecedents of immigrants’ entrepreneurial intention formation process: an empirical study of immigrant entrepreneurs in Canada

“…Risk is defined as the probability of a substantial financial loss, but the same dollar amount of possible loss could be more severe for one entrepreneur than another (Sonfield and Lussier, 2000). While risk may also involve non-financial threats like damage to reputation, it is our view that high risk seen as a threat among immigrants may arouse their own epistemic curiosity (i.e., desire for knowledge that motivates individuals to learn new ideas, eliminates information gaps, and solves intellectual problems : Heinemann et al, 2022). Generally, risk perception has been conceptualized as an assessment of risk by the decision-maker in a given situation (Mullins and Forlani, 2005).…”

Exploring the mediating effect of personality traits in the relationship between entrepreneurial intentions and academic performance among students

“…Similarly, individuals with low-risk tolerance may be more likely to avoid entrepreneurial activities and seek out traditional employment opportunities [79]. Entrepreneurial alertness refers to a person's ability to recognize and identify entrepreneurial opportunities [80,81]. Research has shown that individuals with higher entrepreneurial alertness are most likely to be engrossed in entrepreneurial activities and pursue entrepreneurial opportunities [82,83].…”