See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/280722549

International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business

Article · January 2015

CITATIONS READS

0 5,665

2 authors, including:

Catheryn Khoo-Lattimore
Griffith University
62 PUBLICATIONS   353 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Girlfriend Getaways: Business networks as a destination marketing approach View project

Conceptualising an Attribute-based Framework of Projected and Perceived Destination Food Image: The Case of Australia and its Chinese Market View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Catheryn Khoo-Lattimore on 19 November 2015.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 26, No. 1, 2015 1

Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention:

born or made?

Kim Hoe Looi*

School of Hospitality, Tourism and Culinary Arts,
Taylor’s University,
No. 1, Jalan Taylor’s, 47650 Subang Jaya,
Selangor, Malaysia
Email: kimhoe.looi@taylors.edu.my
*Corresponding author

Catheryn Khoo-Lattimore
Department of Tourism, Sport and Hotel Management,
Griffith Business School,
Griffith University,
170 Kessels Road, Nathan QLD 4111, Australia
Email: c.khoo-lattimore@griffith.edu.au

Abstract: Entrepreneurship is a source of innovation, job creation and

economic growth, as such it is pivotal to attract the young and the educated to
become entrepreneurs. Undergraduates are an important source of nascent
entrepreneurs in the future and consequently it is interesting to explore their
intention for opportunity entrepreneurship. However, there is intellectual
disagreement whether entrepreneurs are born or made. This is a post-positivist
study, cross-sectional and the level of analysis is individual. Hierarchical
regression analysis shows that family business background and gender
explained largest and significant incremental variance in students’
entrepreneurial intention. Consequently, the findings from this study lend
support to the notion that entrepreneurs are more likely born. Knowledge
generated from this study is valuable in the design of entrepreneurship
education, training and development policy to promote opportunity
entrepreneurship.

Keywords: entrepreneurship; background factors; entrepreneurial intention;

born or made; opportunity entrepreneurship.

Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Looi, K.H. and

Khoo-Lattimore, C. (2015) ‘Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention:
born or made?’, Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 26, No. 1,
pp.1–20.

Biographical notes: : Kim Hoe Looi graduated with an honours degree in

Science majoring in Statistics and obtained his MBA in Applied Finance and
Investments from National University of Malaysia (UKM). He teaches
entrepreneurship, management and marketing subjects. He is in his final stage
of PhD study in the field of international entrepreneurship in the Faculty of
Business and Accountancy in University of Malaya, Malaysia.

Copyright © 2015 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

2 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

Catheryn Khoo-Lattimore is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Tourism,

Sport and Hotel Management, Griffith Business School, Griffith University,
Australia. Prior to Australia, she was on sabbatical as a Fulbright Scholar at the
University of Florida, USA.

This paper is a revised and expanded version of a paper entitled ‘Intention for
new venture creation: an empirical study on final year undergraduates’
presented at International Conference on Technology Management, Business
and Entrepreneurship (ICTMBE), Malacca, Malaysia, 18–19 December 2012.

1 Introduction

The entrepreneurial intention of university students consistently attracts scholarly

interest. To encourage entrepreneurship, it is essential to identify and understand the
explanatory variables in different countries and contexts (Dana, 1997, 2001, 2014). In
2014, International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business published several
research conducted in countries located in Asia and Africa. In view of the current high
entrepreneurial level, Hisrich et al. (2007) has labelled 21st century generation as
generation entrepreneur.
For an overview of historical and recent entrepreneurship development in Malaysia,
please see Dana (2001, 2014) and Isenberg (2010). In the last few years, there are regular
competitions on business plans conducted within tertiary institutions in Malaysia with
support from multi-national corporations as well as reality shows on TV, both foreign and
local, where participants compete for investments for their business ideas. In addition,
The Star, a Malaysian daily, regularly publishes success stories of micro and small
entrepreneurs who started their businesses for a variety of reasons. All these created a lot
of publicity and awareness on entrepreneurship in Malaysia. Furthermore, in Global
Entrepreneurship Monitor 2011 Global Report (Kelley et al., 2012), Malaysians
surveyed rated media attention for entrepreneurship at 73.5, entrepreneurship as a good
career choice at 51.5 and high status to successful entrepreneurs at 51.3. The extant
literature suggests that the level of legitimation or values in a society determines the level
of entrepreneurship and from the evidence mentioned above, it can be assumed that the
level of legitimation for entrepreneurship in Malaysia today is higher than before.
Entrepreneurship education is gaining momentum among business schools in
Malaysia, with increasing emphasis either as a single subject or as a programme of study.
This trend seems to reflect the prevalent values of Malaysian society and Etzioni (1987)
suggests that, ceteris paribus, the higher the level of legitimation in a society, the more
the educational system will educate and train entrepreneurs. Although the labour market
continues to offer employment opportunities to fresh graduates, entrepreneurship can be a
more satisfying and rewarding career for many fresh graduates especially with the many
new venture opportunities and support provided by various government agencies.
On the other hand, entrepreneurship is even more relevant when supply of jobs in the
labour market shrinks. Knowledge about entrepreneurship will be very useful when fresh
graduates are unable to find their ideal jobs or retrenched when the economy slows down,
forcing some fresh graduates to turn to entrepreneurship. In the entrepreneurship
literature, this is termed necessity entrepreneurship. Etzioni (1987) uses the term psychic
side-effects to describe resentment that followed if behaviour is changed due to changes
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 3

in constraints vis-à-vis if it is due to a change in preferences. In addition, he theorises that

acceptance of the risk-taking involved will be much higher if entrepreneurship is
legitimated than when it is perceived as a matter of necessity. In view of this, the
Malaysian Government has stated its intention to emphasise opportunity-based
entrepreneurship and move away from necessity-driven entrepreneurship (The Sun,
2012).
Even though past studies examined students’ entrepreneurial intention in different
countries, this study aims to add to the existing body of knowledge by empirically testing
whether students’ entrepreneurial intention is born or made. This study also provides a
useful complement to previous studies by carrying out entrepreneurship research in a
developing and less innovation-driven economy like Malaysia. It is believe that this study
will extend theory because data is collected from a different population using a different
measurement instrument as suggested by Caliendo and Kritikos (2012).
This study proceeds as follows: In the first section relevant literature is reviewed in
order to formulate research purposes and research framework. The next section describes
the research design, followed by sections on results, discussion and limitations. The study
ends with conclusions, contributions and suggestions for future research.

2 Literature review

2.1 Entrepreneurship and new venture creation

Entrepreneurship can play an important role in the economic development of a country
(Coviello and Munro, 1995; Hisrich et al., 1996; Knight and Cavusgil, 1996; Busenitz
et al., 2000; Bosma and Levie, 2010). The literature distinguished two broad types of
entrepreneurship. Opportunity entrepreneurship refers to starting a business to exploit a
perceived unexploited or under-exploited business opportunity, i.e., the voluntary nature
of participation in entrepreneurship. Necessity entrepreneurship, on the other hand, refers
to starting a business as the best option available for employment but not necessarily the
preferred option (Acs et al., 2008; Dana, 1997; Hechavarria and Reynolds, 2009).
Furthermore, new firm creation has been identified as a critical factor in driving the
economic growth of a country (Low and MacMillan, 1988) and generating employment
opportunities (Birch, 1979 cited in Davidsson, 2002; Birley, 1986 cited in Ireland and
Webb, 2007; Acs and Audretsch, 1988 cited in Brouwer, 2002).
Entrepreneurial intention refers to the intention of an individual to start a new
business (Engle et al., 2010) and it is a strong indicator of potential entrepreneurship
(Kelley et al., 2012). However, undergraduates have not yet reached the point of planning
to start a business (i.e., they are at the pre-nascent stage). Therefore, this study assesses
their level of interest or desire in entrepreneurship. In this vein, this study actually
assesses students’ interest in opportunity entrepreneurship.
However, the level of entrepreneurship differs across different stages of economic
development (Acs et al., 2008). In the first stage of economic development with
agricultural and small-scale manufacturing, the level of self-employment is high. In the
second stage of manufacturing economy, rates of self-employment are decreasing
because return from employment is greater than return from self-employment. In the third
stage of services economy, entrepreneurial activities are rising due to better return from
4 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

self-employment. In other words, there is a U-shaped relationship between

entrepreneurial activity and stage of economic development (Acs et al., 2008).

Figure 1 U-shaped relationship between entrepreneurial activity and stage of economic

development (see online version for colours)

There are two other important implications that can be derived from this theory. The first
implication is that necessity entrepreneurship is prominent in the first stage of economic
development whereas there are more opportunity entrepreneurship in the third stage of
economic development. The second implication is that the level of entrepreneurship
seems to be moderated by the stage of economic development of a country.
The level of entrepreneurial intention among younger generation could be lower due
to the increase in inter-generational mobility within business families as children of
business owners increasingly opt for a different career than their parents (Blau and
Duncan, 1967 cited in Wennekers et al., 2002). Besides, the younger generations are
better educated than their parents who have no better choice but to opt for necessity
entrepreneurship. Better education will open up wider employment opportunities, provide
higher return and security from employment, as well as pursuing professional ambitions
rather than engaging in entrepreneurship.

2.2 Determinants of entrepreneurial intention

It is well-documented in the existing literature that environmental factors such as history,

region, ethnic, social, culture, economic, legal and politics can motivate entrepreneurial
behaviour such as new venture creation (Vesper, 1982; Sexton, 1982; Shapero and Sokol,
1982; Dollinger, 2003; Hechavarria and Reynolds, 2009). Minniti and Nardone (2007)
contend that firstly, there are factors that influence entrepreneurship across all countries,
i.e. universal determinants of entrepreneurial behaviour. Secondly, there are aspects of
entrepreneurship that are culture specific. A significant amount of research in various
fields has investigated what variables are universally correlated to the decision to start a
business and most scholars agreed that it is a complex decision to start a business.
As a result of the myriad of determinants of entrepreneurship, some authors have
attempted to categorise these factors using various approaches. For instance, the
Schumpeterian school argues that entrepreneurs tend to be born whereas the Kirznerian
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 5

school argues that it is possible to train entrepreneurs (Dana, 2001). Arenius and Minniti
(2005) propose four factors, which are demographic (age, gender, education and work
status), economic (household incomes), perceptual variables (opportunity perception,
self-efficacy, fear of failure and knowing other entrepreneurs) and environment
(technology, level of economic development, culture, institutions and country effects).
Arenius and Minniti’s (2005) proposition is similiar to Thompson’s (2009) personal,
cognition and environment classification. Wennekers et al. (2002) broadly classify the
determinants of entrepreneurship into macro level (technology, economic, culture and
institutions) and micro level (age, ethnicity, level of education attained, gender and
previous experience in self-employment). Naffziger et al. (1994) hypothesise that the
decision to behave entrepreneurially is the result of the interaction of:
1 personal characteristic
2 personal environment (family status, sex, entrepreneurial family background and
education)

3 business environment (societal attitudes, economic climate, availability of accessible

funds, entrepreneurship-supportive network and incubators)
4 ideas
5 personal goals
6 expectation-outcome comparison
7 implementation-outcome perception.
One approach to broaden the understanding of venture creation is to examine
demographic characteristics (Shook et al., 2003). Existing literature documented the
importance of demographic factors (also referred to as personal factors), for example,
family background, prior education, social connections, networks and gender to produce
entrepreneurial potential (Veciana et al., 2005; Licht, 2010; Kelley et al., 2012).

2.2.1 Family business background

Role models and family are conjectured to relate to the emergence of entrepreneurship
(Brockhaus and Horwitz, 1986; Shapero and Sokol, 1982). However, role model and
family are not synonymous because role model is a wider concept that includes other
people besides family.
Current literature indicates that family background can be a push or pull factor for
entrepreneurship (Dyer and Handler, 1994). The push factor or negative motivation is a
result of poverty, insecurity and neglect childhood. On the other hand, the pull factor or
positive motivation comes from family business with parental role models, significant
family responsibilities at a young age or opportunities to engage in entrepreneurial
activities. As a result, these children learned and developed the skills, values, confidence
and experience for an entrepreneurial career in the future. Previous research suggests that
higher level of prior family business exposure is positively associated with
entrepreneurial intention (Begley et al., 2005; Carr and Sequeira, 2007; Matthews and
Moser, 1996; Veciana et al., 2005; Wang and Wong, 2004).
6 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

2.2.2 Gender
Many studies found that male generally have stronger entrepreneurial intention than
females (Blanchflower, 2004; Begley et al., 2005; Delmar and Davidsson, 2000;
Matthews and Moser, 1996; Minniti and Nardone, 2007; Langowitz and Minniti, 2007;
Veciana et al., 2005; Wilson et al., 2007; Wang and Wong, 2004; Xavier et al., 2012;
Zhao et al., 2005). In some studies, gender was found to be the strongest distinguishing
factor for entrepreneurial intention (Delmar and Davidsson, 2000; Matthews and Moser,
1996). Although majority of these studies drew data from student samples, nevertheless
the results compliment the consistent findings of Global Entrepreneurship Monitor that
entrepreneurship among women is lower than men (Xavier et al., 2013). Minniti and
Nardone (2007) argue that the difference in the propensity to start a business across
gender can be universally attributed primarily to perceptual factors.

2.2.3 Age
Findings across studies, time, regions and gender found that entrepreneurship rates
generally are the highest in the 25 to 34 years-old cohort (Delmar and Davidsson, 2000;
Langowitz and Minniti, 2007; Wennekers et al., 2002; Xavier et al., 2012) although some
also noticed a trend towards entrepreneurship at a younger age (Wennekers et al., 2002).
This seems to be the main reason why student sample is very common in entrepreneurial
intention research (see Begley et al., 2005; Engle et al., 2010; Krueger et al., 2000; Linan
and Chen, 2009; Linan et al., 2011; Wang and Wong, 2004) since they will face
important career decision in the near future.
Even though undergraduates have not yet reached the point of planning to start a
business (i.e., they are at the pre-nascent stage) but researchers are interested to assess
undergraduates’ level of interest in new venture creation because they are an important
source of nascent entrepreneurs in the future. Furthermore, it is likely that undergraduates
may decide to become an entrepreneur prior to actual identification of an entrepreneurial
opportunity (Engle et al., 2010).

2.2.4 Work experience

Through work experience gained from employment, potential entrepreneurs develop and
enhance their knowledge, skills and commercial awareness. In other words, a potential
entrepreneur’s past and present experience act as an incubator that exerts a central and
often pivotal influence on their capability to effectively engage in opportunity recognition
and exploitation (Cooper and Park, 2008).
Besides work experience, family background and education should also increase
self-efficacy of potential entrepreneurs. However, academic knowledge alone is
insufficient and it is the commercial experience that is pivotal in driving home the
realities of the market (Cooper and Park, 2008). Moreover, the work experience of men
and women is different (Brush, 1992).

2.2.5 Education
Unlike age and gender, there is intellectual disagreement on the impact of education on
entrepreneurship (Blanchflower, 2004; Crant, 1996; Minniti and Nardone, 2007; Wang
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 7

and Wong, 2004; Wennekers et al., 2002). In addition, the effect of education on
entrepreneurship also differs in different country, for example, in Europe the relationship
is negative, while the opposite is true in the USA (Blanchflower, 2004). This anomaly is
plausible because university education is vital in the development and nurturing of
entrepreneurial capital (Cooper and Park, 2008). On the other hand, education will open
up more employment opportunities, provide higher return and security from employment,
thus reducing the intention for entrepreneurship.
Some researchers found that specialisation in business studies positively and
strongly influence entrepreneurial intentions (Fukuda, 2014; Tkachev and Kolvereid,
1999).
Langowitz and Minniti (2007) found that education has no significant relationship to
women’s intentionality to start businesses, which means that even a higher level of
education attainment may not stimulate more women entrepreneurs. In contrast,
Wilson et al. (2007) suggest that providing access to entrepreneurship education
is critical to promote women entrepreneurs because education can raise their levels
of self-efficacy and ultimately their entrepreneurial intention. Delmar and Davidsson
(2000) posit that most of the gender differences in intentionality can be confounded
by variables such as education and experience. In order to investigate a pure gender
effect, education level and work experience, amongst other variables, will have to be
controlled.
One study notes that although the education attainment of women entrepreneurs is
comparable to men but most often they studied liberal arts rather than business,
engineering or technical subjects (Brush, 1992). In some studies, comparison of
entrepreneurial intention between sexes was based on engineering, science and
computing student sample (e.g., Wang and Wong, 2004).
Although there are suggestions for entrepreneurship education (Isenberg, 2010)
and its inclusion in entrepreneurial intentions models (Peterman and Kennedy,
2003), however, there is minimal research conducted on the specific effects of
entrepreneurial education (Shook et al., 2003). Therefore, instead of investigating the
effect of education in general, it is more fruitful to control the level of education and
education specialisation to examine the impact of entrepreneurship education on
entrepreneurial intention.
On the basis of prior studies and theory, the present study will delimit
itself to personal factors such as gender, education and role models (Brockhaus
and Horwitz, 1986; Crant, 1996; Delmar and Davidsson, 2000), particularly family under
role models. The extraneous variables controlled are age, education level, education
specialisation (this study examines business and hospitality students only) and work
experience.

2.3 Research framework

Based on literature reviewed, the model to explore whether undergraduate students’

entrepreneurial intention is born or made is formulated below. In this model, family
business background and gender are proxies for entrepreneurial intention that is born
while education and entrepreneurship education are proxies for entrepreneurial intention
that is made.
8 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

Figure 2 Research framework

Family
business
background

Gender
Entrepreneurial
intention

Education

Entrepreneurship
education

2.4 Research objectives

All the theoretical underpinnings above provide support to investigate the influence of
background variables and education on students’ entrepreneurial intention. This will not
only enrich the existing research concerning entrepreneurship outside Western context
(Hisrich et al., 2007) but also has practical implications such as inform the design of
government policy and education syllabus to attain a higher level of legitimation to
promote entrepreneurship among undergraduate students.
Therefore, the first aim of this study is to investigate undergraduates’ intention for
new venture creation in the future. The second aim is to identify variable(s) (i.e.,
education which is operationalised in this research as programme of study and previous
entrepreneurship education; gender and family business background) that will predict
students’ entrepreneurial intention. In other words, is students’ entrepreneurial intention
born or made?

2.5 Research design

The research design suggested by Cavana et al. (2001) guided the researchers on a series
of rational decision-making to choose the most appropriate research method for this
study. This includes purpose, extent of interference, study setting, unit of analysis and
time horizon.
There are two purposes for conducting this study. The first purpose is to describe
undergraduate students’ intention to create new venture in the future. The second purpose
is to test cause-effect to explain the nature of relationships. The extent of researcher
interference is minimal; the study setting is non-contrived and the time horizon is
cross-sectional. The level of analysis is individual because the first element of a
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 9

psychological approach to new venture creation is focus on the person. In other words,
this study is interested in person who can conceive possibilities, is innovative and
motivated to create new venture (Shaver and Scott, 1991).
Data collection instrument is a multiple-item questionnaire consisting of two parts.
Part 1 consists of four intention items indicating different aspects of intention to start
business within the next five years or so after student’s graduation (henceforth shortened
to ‘in the future’). The response scale is a 6-point Likert scale: ‘1’ means ‘extremely
likely”, ‘2’ means ‘quite likely’, ‘3’ means ‘slightly likely’, ‘4’ means ‘slightly unlikely’,
‘5’ means ‘quite unlikely’ and ‘6’ means ‘extremely unlikely’. The intention items are
informed by empirical literature on intention and entrepreneurial intention, followed the
suggested procedure for developing better measures (Churchill, 1979) and positively
worded. Part 2 collects student’s personal data such as programme of study, gender,
whether family is involved in business and whether student has previous entrepreneurship
education. The questionnaire is in English because the medium of instruction in this
tertiary institution is English, therefore, it is assumed that all students should be proficient
in English. Pilot testing was carried out on 31 second year students and there was no
report of any difficulty to answer all questions except for two questions in Part 2 because
the sentences were somewhat poorly structured that led to confusion. Consequently, some
changes were made in the final questionnaire to make these two questions unambiguous
and easier to understand.
In this study, sampling design is purposive, where final year undergraduate students
from the School of Business and the School of Hospitality Management are selected.
University student sample is very common in entrepreneurial intention research (see
Linan and Chen, 2009; Engle et al., 2010). The rationale for choosing these two schools
is firstly, it is presumed that these students are more likely to create new venture in the
future due to their fields of study. Secondly, final year students should have already
thought about what they want to pursue after graduation, i.e., making a career choice.
Thirdly, final year students are a good proxy for those young people who will start a firm
(Linan and Chen, 2009; Kelley et al., 2012). Finally, student sample also offers the
advantages of similar age and qualifications, making it more homogeneous (Linan and
Chen, 2009). Participation is confined to Malaysian students to achieve as much
homogeneity as possible.
A research assistant briefed undergraduate students on matters such as purpose of this
research; the voluntary nature of the survey; the assurance of the anonymity of their
responses; and a word of encouragement to participate. Students filled in the
questionnaires in class and returned them on-the-spot. Data analysis technique is
quantitative using SPSS software to analyse psychometric properties such as reliability,
generate descriptive and inferential statistics. For intention, the mean is calculated by
averaging all the responses to four items indexing intention. This is the most common
approach to create summated scales by averaging all the items in the scale (Hair et al.,
2006).

2.6 Results
A total of 768 questionnaires were collected. A quick check was performed in class when
collecting the questionnaires from undergraduate students and questionnaires were
returned to them on-the-spot to fill in any missing response. After data cleaning, the final
10 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

sample size is 755 respondents which include 300 students who are studying Bachelor of
Business programme, 258 students who are studying Bachelor of Hospitality
Management programme, 52 students pursuing Diploma in Business programme and 142
students pursuing Diploma in Hospitality Management programme and three students did
not indicate their programme of study. Overall, students from the School of Business
made up 47% of the sample and students from the School of Hospitality Management
made up 53%. The sample consists of 45% male and 53.5% female whereas 1.5% of
students did not answer this question on gender.

Figure 3 Breakdown of respondents by programme of study (see online version for colours)

Data was checked for normality by visually examining normal probability plot (Hair
et al., 2006) for intention construct. The line representing the actual data distribution
mostly followed the diagonal line, thus indicating normality of data. The Cronbach’s
alpha for intention is 0.904 and is therefore reliable.
Table 1 shows students’ intention to start new business in the future by programme of
study. Intention is measured by 1 = ‘Extremely likely’ and 6 = ‘Extremely unlikely’,
therefore smaller numbers indicate higher levels of intention to start business in the
future. From Table 1, the overall intention to start business in the future is 2.77 and
interpreted as ‘slightly likely’. For the School of Business, the minimum intention score
is 2.32 for the Diploma in Business programme and the maximum intention score is 2.86
for the Bachelor of Business programme. For the School of Hospitality Management,
students’ intentions for both Bachelor and Diploma programmes are same as overall
mean, i.e., 2.77. Between these two schools, it seems that students from the Diploma in
Business programme have the highest intention to start business in the future while
students from the Bachelor of Business programme indicated the lowest intention level
(Table 1). One-way ANOVA reveals that the intentions to start business in the future are
statistically different across programme of study (p-value = 0.031), which means that the
effect of programme of study on intention to start business in the future is significant and
the power to detect the effect is very strong (0.999) (Table 2). Post hoc test using
Tamhane revealed the differences in intentions to start business in the future are between:
1 Diploma in Business programme and Bachelor of Hospitality programme
2 Diploma in Business programme and Bachelor of Business programme.
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 11

Table 1 Intentions to start business by programme of study

Programme of study Mean Remark

Overall 2.77
Bachelor of Business 2.86 Above overall mean
Diploma in Business 2.32 Below overall mean
Bachelor of Hospitality Management 2.77 Similar to overall mean
Diploma in Hospitality Management 2.77 Similar to overall mean

Table 2 Tests of between-subjects effects

Effect F P-value Observed power

Programme of study 2.972 0.031* 0.704
Note: *Significant at 0.05 level

The intentions to start business in the future are statistically different across gender,
where male students are more likely to start new business compare with female students.
Next, the intentions to start business in the future are statistically different for different
family backgrounds with higher intention for those from family involved in business.
Finally, the intention to start business in the future for students who have previous
entrepreneurship education is statistically different from students without previous
entrepreneurship education. Students who previously studied entrepreneurship exhibit a
higher level of intention to start business in the future (Table 3).

Table 3 Intention to start business by background factors

Intention
Standard
Mean t-test
deviation
Gender Male students 2.56 1.20 p-value =
0.000*
Female students 2.96 1.19
Family Family is involved in business 2.62 1.13 p-value =
background 0.000*
Family is not involved in business 3.07 1.33
Previous With previous entrepreneurship 2.59 1.12 p-value =
entrepreneurship education 0.002*
education
Without previous entrepreneurship 2.87 1.26
education
Note: *Significant at 0.05 level

Figure 4 shows the relationship between percentage of students who have previous
entrepreneurship education within various programme of study and intentions to start
new business in the future. There is a positive linear relationship between these two
variables.
12 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

Figure 4 Positive relationship between percentage of students who have previous

entrepreneurship education within various programme of study and intentions
(see online version for colours)

4
3.5
3
Intention

2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
% studied entrepreneurship

Analyses were performed to test the combined effect of gender and programme of study;
gender and family background; gender and previous entrepreneurship education;
programme of study and family background; programme of study and previous
entrepreneurship education; family background and previous entrepreneurship education;
programme of study, family background and previous entrepreneurship education. All
combined effects were found non-significant at 0.05 level, indicating the absence of
combined effect.
To answer the second question whether students’ entrepreneurial intention is born or
made, regression technique with dummy variables was employed. From Table 4, the
three regression models using forward inclusion are significant (p < 0.05). The
coefficients for family business background and gender are significant at 0.01 level while
previous entrepreneurship education is significant at 0.05 level. The adjusted R2 for
Model 3 is 0.061. To determine the relative importance of predictors, absolute values of
beta and the order in which the predictor enter into the regression model are used
(Malhotra, 2007). Family business background has the largest coefficient (–0.174 and
significant at 0.01 level). Next is gender (–0.161 and significant at 0.01 level) followed
by previous entrepreneurship education (–0.082 and significant at 0.05 level). Besides
this, from the three models in Table 4, family business background is always the first
predictor and gender is the second predictor to enter into the model. The last to enter the
model is previous entrepreneurship education. Hence, these results are interpreted to
mean that family business background and gender are stronger predictors of students’
entrepreneurial intention. In all three models, programme of study was excluded, which
means it is non-significant. The VIFs are around 1 and the average VIF is not
substantially greater than 1. Furthermore, tolerance is above 0.2. Both tests confirmed
that there is no multi-collinearity.
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 13

Table 4 Results of regression

Standardised
Adjusted R square Sig. F coefficients
Model Sig.
R square change change
Beta
1 Family business background .028 .030 .000 –.172** .000
no vs. yes
2 Family business background .056 .029 .000 –.179** .000
no vs. yes
Gender female vs. male –.169** .000
3 Family business background .061 .007 .021 –.174** .000
no vs. yes
Gender female vs. male –.161** .000
Previous entrepreneurship –.082* .021
education no vs. yes
Notes: Dependent variable is entrepreneurial intention
*Significant at 0.05 level. **Significant at 0.01 level.

2.7 Discussions
2.7.1 Intentions to start new business in the future
The survey results of entrepreneurial intentions are consonant with recent research by
Kelley et al. (2012). With a moderate level of intention to start business in the future
among undergraduate students, it is not surprising that the Entrepreneurial Intentions
percentage among Malaysians reported by Global Entrepreneurship Monitor is low. The
Entrepreneurial Intentions in Malaysia is only 8.7, which is tenth lowest among
54 countries surveyed by Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (Kelley et al., 2012) and
below the 54 countries’ average of 10.3 (the lowest is 2.4 and the highest is 55.8).
A plausible explanation for the moderate level of undergraduates’ intention to start
new business in the future despite the high level of legitimation is the U-shaped
relationship between entrepreneurial activity and stage of economic development (Acs
et al., 2008). Since Malaysia is classified as an efficiency-driven economy by Global
Entrepreneurship Monitor, in this stage of economic development the return from
employment is higher than self-employment, thus the level of entrepreneurial intention is
low. At the same time, this moderate level of entrepreneurial intentions may also be
attributed to better educated generation with wider employment opportunities, higher
return and security from employment, as well as pursuing professional ambitions rather
than engaging in entrepreneurship.

2.7.2 Family business background

The findings on the influence of family are consistent with previous studies (Begley et al.
2005; Carr and Sequeira, 2007; Veciana et al., 2003; Wang and Wong, 2004). The
positive influence of parental role models enables their children to ‘learn by example’
(Caliendo and Kritikos, 2012). Since 83% of students from Diploma in Business
programme came from families who are involved in business, consequently they are
14 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

more likely than other students to create new venture in the future and therefore should
be targeted to develop their entrepreneurial potential.

2.7.3 Gender

Intention for new venture creation in the future is lower for female undergraduates and
this finding is consistent with lower entrepreneurship rate of women than men (Begley
et al., 2005; Blanchflower, 2004; Caliendo and Kritikos, 2012; Kelley et al., 2012;
Langowitz and Minniti, 2007; Minniti and Nardone, 2007; Veciana et al., 2003; Wang
and Wong, 2004; Wilson et al., 2007; Xavier et al., 2013). The results suggest that
although female have comparable level of education with male, they are still less incline
toward a career in entrepreneurship.
This study reasons that Malaysia, being a developing and less innovation-driven
economy, shows comparable pattern with industrialised countries in terms of lower
tendency among women toward entrepreneurship. Verheul et al. (2012) attribute
this phenomenon to both a relative lack of willingness among women and the
existence of gender-specific obstacles. From this study, these gender-specific obstacles
seem to exist in both Western and Oriental cultures and therefore merits further scholarly
investigation.

2.7.4 Programme of study

As signalled by the result, the intentions to start business in the future differ significantly
across programmes of study. It appears that potential entrepreneurs are more likely to
come from some programmes of study relative to other programmes of study.
Nevertheless, this study argues that the overall intention to start business is moderate for
both schools and more needs to be done to develop a larger pool of potential
entrepreneurs.

2.7.5 Previous entrepreneurship education

The results also suggest that knowledge about entrepreneurship gained from
previous entrepreneurship education can increase the likelihood of new venture
creation in the future. There is a positive linear relationship between percentage
of students with previous entrepreneurship education within various programme of study
and intentions to start business in the future. The result corroborates with Fukuda’s
(2014) findings that entrepreneurial experience positively affects entrepreneurial
intention. Students who have previous entrepreneurship education indicate higher
intentions probably as a result of higher perceptions of desirability and feasibility
(Begley et al., 2005; Peterman and Kennedy, 2003; Shapero and Sokol, 1982) or
self-efficacy (Carr and Sequeira, 2007). Therefore, there is a high possibility that by
exposing students to entrepreneurship, their intentions to start new business in the future
will increase. Consequently, there will be a larger pool of potential entrepreneurs in the
future who are expected to respond more favourably to future surveys of entrepreneurial
intentions by Global Entrepreneurship Monitor and more importantly higher
entrepreneurial activity level in the future.
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 15

2.7.6 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention: born or made?

The four variables of family business background, gender, programme of study and
previous entrepreneurship education individually affect undergraduate students’
entrepreneurial intention.
The central thrust of this study is to explore whether students’ entrepreneurial
intention is born or made via the examination of the relative importance of family
business background, gender, programme of study and previous entrepreneurship
education. For the specific purpose of this study, the proxies for born entrepreneurs are
family business background and gender whereas the proxies for made entrepreneurs are
programme of study and previous entrepreneurship education.
Family business background appears to be the most important predictor of students’
entrepreneurial intention. This is very plausible because students observed what their
parents are doing almost on a daily basis over a long period of time. This is coupled with
the responsibilities and opportunities provided by their parents as part of family’s training
and learning. The regression results also compliment previous findings that gender has a
strong influence on entrepreneurship (Delmar and Davidsson, 2000; Matthews and
Moser, 1996).
Programme of study is non-significant in the regression model, thus extending
the intellectual disagreement on the impact of education on entrepreneurship as
well as the differing effect of education on entrepreneurship in different country.
Even though students from these two schools are presumed to be more incline
towards entrepreneurship, the finding is contrary to expectation. This study reveals
that previous entrepreneurship education is the least significant determinant of
students’ entrepreneurial intention. It is reasonable to argue that although
entrepreneurship education might raise the students’ entrepreneurial intention,
however the entrepreneurship education is only over a relatively short period of time, as
such the influence exerted is intuitively not very strong compared with family and
gender.
Thus, in the context of the present study, it seems that undergraduate students’
entrepreneurial intentions are more likely born than made.

2.8 Limitations and suggestions for future research

This finding that undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intentions are born rather
than made is suggestive rather than conclusive. Moreover, the discussion put forth
in this paper does not intend to negate the important influence of entrepreneurship
education. Rather, it is speculated that entrepreneurship education will be more effective
on born entrepreneurs than made entrepreneurs. Future research should be designed to
control for students’ family business background and gender in order to evaluate
pure effect of entrepreneurship education. Alternatively, future research can
investigate the moderating effect of family business background and gender
for the relationship between entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurship intention.
After all, the time students spent in the family are much longer compared with in the
university.
The present study is limited to one country and majority of respondents are from one
ethnic group. Future research should take cognisant that different explanatory variables
16 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

may be relevant to specific ethnic groups (Dana, 1997). The other limitations are this
study only covers undergraduate students from two schools from a private university and
the results are therefore not generalisable. It is possible that results may be significantly
different if the samples included students from other schools, postgraduate level or other
universities. Although this study only investigates selected personal factors, it does not
downplay the important influence of other personal and environmental variables on
entrepreneurial intention.
Entrepreneurship is found in all professions. As such, it will be interesting for future
research to investigate students from other schools at this particular university, especially
in the pure science disciplines such as medicine, biosciences, engineering, et cetera. In
this manner, a comparison on intentions to start business in the future between students
from social sciences and pure sciences can be conducted.
It is also possible to continue this study by collecting data from public universities in
Malaysia to see whether differences exist between private and public universities
Malaysian universities (both private and public) versus foreign universities.
Last but not least, in order to encourage more female undergraduates to choose
entrepreneurship as a career, more research is needed to empirically verify the
proposition of gender-specific obstacles and identify ways to overcome them. This is
important not just for academicians but for women and public policy makers as well as to
facilitate women entrepreneurship in Malaysia.

2.9 Conclusions
Entrepreneurship is a viable, satisfying, rewarding and valued career option for graduates.
In recognition of the immense contributions of entrepreneurs, they are sometimes
colloquially referred to as the ‘movers’ and ‘shakers’ in society. If entrepreneurship is
considered a source of innovation, job creation and economic growth for a country, then
it is pivotal to attract the young and the educated to become entrepreneurs. In view of the
many opportunities for new venture creation in Malaysia, undergraduate students should
be equipped for opportunity entrepreneurship.
The purpose of this paper is twofold. The first purpose is to describe undergraduate
students’ intention to start a business in the future. The second purpose is to test whether
students’ entrepreneurial intention is born or made. Based on the sample surveyed, this
study found that undergraduates’ propensity for new venture creation in the future is only
slightly likely, suggesting that undergraduate students have a not so favourable
perception of entrepreneurship as a career option. Individually, the four demographic
factors included in this study are related to students’ entrepreneurial intention. The notion
of born entrepreneur is supported by both proxies (i.e., family business background and
gender) whereas the notion of made entrepreneur is only supported by one proxy (i.e.,
previous entrepreneurship education) and the least significant factor. In the light of these
findings, therefore, this study argues that entrepreneurs are more likely to be born than
made.
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 17

References
Acs, Z.J., Desai, S. and Hessels, J. (2008) ‘Entrepreneurship, economic development and
institutions’, Small Business Economics, Vol. 31, No. 3, pp.219–234.
Arenius, P. and Minniti, M. (2005) ‘Perceptual variables and nascent entrepreneurship’, Small
Business Economics, Vol. 24, No. 3, pp.233–247.
Begley, T.M., Tan, W.L. and Schoch, H. (2005) ‘Politico-economic factors associated with interest
in starting a business: a multi-country study’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 29,
No. 1, pp.33–55.
Blanchflower, D.G. (2004) Self-Employment: More May Not Be Better, NBER working paper No.
10286 [online] http://www.nber.org/papers/w10286 (accessed 11 November 2013).
Bosma, N. and Levie, J. (2010) Global Entrepreneurship Monitor 2009 Executive Report [online]
http://www.gemconsortium.org/docs/download/265 (accessed 21 July 2010).
Brockhaus, R.H. and Horwitz, P.S. (1986) ‘The psychology of the entrepreneur’, in Sexton, D.L.
and Smilor, R.W. (Eds.): The Art and Science of Entrepreneurship, pp.25–48, Ballinger
Publishing Company, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Brouwer, M.T. (2002) ‘Weber, Schumpeter and Knight on entrepreneurship and economic
development’, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Vol. 12, Nos. 1–2, pp.83–105.
Brush, C.G. (1992) ‘Research on women business owners: pat trends, a new perspective and future
directions’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 16, No. 4, pp.5–30.
Busenitz, L.W., Gomez, C. and Spencer, J.W. (2000) ‘Country institutional profiles: unlocking
entrepreneurial phenomena’, Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 43, No. 5, pp.994–1003.
Caliendo, M. and Kritikos, A. (2012) ‘Searching for the entrepreneurial personality: new evidence
and venues for further research’, Journal of Economic Psychology, Vol. 33, No. 2,
pp.319–324.
Carr, J.C. and Sequeira, J.M. (2007) ‘Prior family business exposure as intergenerational influence
and entrepreneurial intent: a theory of planned behavior approach’, Journal of Business
Research, Vol. 60, No. 10, pp.1090–1098.
Cavana, R.Y., Delahaye, B.L. and Sekaran, U. (2001) Applied Business Research: Qualitative and
Quantitative Methods, John Wiley and Sons Australia, Ltd., Milton, Australia.
Churchill, G.A. (1979) ‘A paradigm for developing better measures of marketing constructs’,
Journal of Marketing Research, Vol. 16, No. 1, pp.64–73.
Cooper, S.Y. and Park, J.S. (2008) ‘The impact of ‘incubator’ organizations on opportunity
recognition and technology innovation in new, entrepreneurial high-technology ventures’,
International Small Business Journal, Vol. 26, No. 1, pp.27–56.
Coviello, N.E. and Munro, H.J. (1995) ‘Growing the entrepreneurial firm: networking for
international market development’, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 29, No. 7, pp.49–61.
Crant, J.M. (1996) ‘The proactive personality scale as a predictor of entrepreneurial intentions’,
Journal of Small Business Management, Vol. 34, No. 3, pp.42–49.
Dana, L-P. (1997) ‘The origins of self-employment in ethno-cultural communities: distinguishing
between orthodox entrepreneurship and reactionary enterprise’, Canadian Journal of
Administrative Sciences, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp.52–68.
Dana, L-P. (2001) ‘The education and training of entrepreneurs in Asia’, Education + Training,
Vol. 43, Nos. 8–9, pp.405–416.
Dana, L-P. (2014) Asian Models of Entrepreneurship – From the Indian Union and Nepal to the
Japanese Archipelago: Context, Policy and Practice, 2nd ed., World Scientific, Singapore.
Davidsson, P. (2002) ‘What entrepreneurship research can do for business and policy practice’,
International Journal of Entrepreneurial Education, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp.5–24.
Delmar, F. and Davidsson, P. (2000) ‘Where do they come from? Prevalance and characteristics of
nascent entrepreneurs’, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, Vol. 12, No. 1, pp.1–23.
18 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

Dollinger, M.J. (2003) Entrepreneurship: Strategies and Resources, 3rd international ed., Prentice
Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ.
Dyer, W.G. and Handler, W. (1994) ‘Entrepreneurship and family business: exploring the
connections’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp.71–83.
Engle, R.L., Dimitriadi, N., Gavidia, J.V., Schlaegel, C., Delanoe, S., Alvarado, I., He, X.,
Buame, S. and Wolff, B. (2010) ‘Entrepreneurial intent: a twelve-country evaluation of
Ajzen’s model of planned behaviour’, International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour and
Research, Vol. 16, No. 1, pp.35–57.
Etzioni, A. (1987) ‘Entrepreneurship, adaptation and legitimation: a macro-behavioural
perspective’, Journal of Economic Behaviour and Organization, Vol. 8, No. 2, pp.175–189.
Fukuda, K. (2014) ‘An empirical study on entrepreneurial intentions among Japanese university
students’, International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 21, No. 2,
pp.216–230.
Hair, J.F., Black, W.C., Babin, B.J., Anderson, R.E and Tatham, R.L. (2006) Multivariate Data
Analysis, 6th ed., Pearson Education Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ.
Hechavarria, D.M. and Reynolds, P.D. (2009) ‘Cultural norms and business start-ups: the impact of
national values on opportunity and necessity entrepreneurs’, International Entrepreneurship
Management Journal, Vol. 5, No. 4, pp.417–437.
Hisrich, R., Honig-Haftel, S., McDougall, P. and Oviatt, B. (1996) ‘Guest editorial: International
entrepreneurship: past, present and future’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 20,
No. 4, pp.5–7.
Hisrich, R., Langan-Fox, J. and Grant, S. (2007) ‘Entrepreneurship research and practice: a call to
action for psychology’, American Psychologist, Vol. 62, No. 6, pp.575–589.
Ireland, R.D. and Webb, J.W. (2007) ‘A cross-disciplinary exploration of entrepreneurship
research’, Journal of Management, Vol. 33, No. 6, pp.891–927.
Isenberg, D.J. (2010) ‘How to start an entrepreneurial revolution’, Harvard Business Review,
Vol. 88, No. 6, pp.40–50.
Kelley, D.J., Singer, S. and Herrington, M. (2012) Global Entrepreneurship Monitor 2011 Global
Report [online] http://www.gemconsortium.org/docs/2409/gem-2011-global-report (accessed
7 August 2012).
Knight, G.A. and Cavusgil, S.T. (1996) ‘The born global firm: a challenge to traditional
internationalization theory’, Advances in International Marketing, Vol. 8, pp.11–26.
Krueger, N.F., Reilly, M.D. and Carsrud, A.L. (2000) ‘Competing models of entrepreneurial
intentions’, Journal of Business Venturing, Vol. 15, Nos. 5–6, pp.411–432.
Langowitz, N. and Minniti, M. (2007) ‘The entrepreneurial propensity of women’,
Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 31, No. 3, pp.341–364.
Licht, A.N. (2010) ‘Entrepreneurial motivations, culture and the law’, in Freytag, A. and Thurik, R.
(Eds.): Entrepreneurship and Culture, pp.11–39, Springer, Heidelberg.
Linan, F. and Chen, Y. (2009) ‘Development and cross-cultural application of a specific instrument
to measure entrepreneurial intentions’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 33,
No. 3, pp.593–617.
Linan, F., Rodriguez-Cohard, J.C. and Rueda-Cantuche, J.M. (2011) ‘Factors affecting
entrepreneurial intention levels: a role for education’, International Entrepreneurship and
Management Journal, Vol. 7, No. 2, pp.195–218.
Low, M.B. and MacMillan, I.C. (1988) ‘Entrepreneurship: past research and future challenges’,
Journal of Management Development, Vol. 14, No. 2, pp.139–161.
Malhotra, N.K. (2007) Marketing Research: An Applied Orientation, 5th ed., Pearson Education,
Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ.
Matthews, C.H. and Moser, S.B. (1996) ‘A longitudinal investigation of the impact of family
background and gender on interest in small firm ownership’, Journal of Small Business
Management, Vol. 34, No. 2, pp.29–43.
 Undergraduate students’ entrepreneurial intention 19

Minniti, M. and Nardone, C. (2007) ‘Being in someone else's shoes: the role of gender in nascent
entrepreneurship’, Small Business Economics, Vol. 28, Nos. 2–3, pp.223–238.
Naffziger, D.W., Hornsby, J.S. and Kuratko, D.F. (1994) ‘A proposed research model of
entrepreneurial motivation’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 18, No. 3,
pp.29–42.
Peterman, N.E. and Kennedy, J. (2003) ‘Enterprise education: influencing students’ perceptions of
entrepreneurship’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 28, No. 2, pp.129–144.
Sexton, D.L. (1982) Research Needs and Issues in Entrepreneurship, Prentice-Hall Inc.,
Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
Shapero, A. and Sokol, L. (1982) ‘The social dimensions of entrepreneurship’, in Kent, C.,
Sexton, D. and Vesper, K. (Eds.): Encyclopedia of Entrepreneurship, pp.72–90, Prentice-Hall
Inc., Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
Shaver, K.G. and Scott, L.R. (1991) ‘Person, process, choice: the psychology of new venture
creation’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 16, No. 2, pp.23–45.
Shook, C.L., Priem, R.L. and McGee, J.E. (2003) ‘Venture creation and the enterprising individual:
a review and synthesis’, Journal of Management, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp.379–399.
The Sun (2012) ‘Focus on opportunity-driven entrepreneurship: Khaled’, 28 February.
Thompson, E.R. (2009) ‘Individual entrepreneurial intent: construct clarification and development
of an internationally reliable metric’, Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 33, No. 3,
pp.669–694.
Tkachev, A. and Kolvereid, L. (1999) ‘Self-employment intentions among Russian students’,
Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, Vol. 11, No. 3, pp.269–280.
Veciana, J.M., Aponte, M. and Urbano, D. (2005) ‘University students’ attitudes towards
entrepreneurship: a two countries comparison’, International Entrepreneurship and
Management Journal, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp.165–182.
Verheul, I., Thurik, R., Grilo, I. and van der Zwan, P. (2012) ‘Explaining preferences and actual
involvement in self-employment: gender and the entrepreneurial personality’, Journal of
Economic Psychology, Vol. 33, No. 2, pp.325–341.
Vesper, K.H. (1982) Introduction and Summary of Entrepreneurship Research, Prentice-Hall Inc.,
Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
Wang, C.K. and Wong, P.K. (2004) ‘Entrepreneurial interest of university students in Singapore’,
Technovation, Vol. 24, No. 2, pp.163–172.
Wennekers, S., Uhlaner, L.M. and Thurik, R. (2002) ‘Entrepreneurship and its conditions: a macro
perspective’, International Journal of Entrepreneurship Education, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp.25–65.
Wilson, F., Kickul, J. and Marlino, D. (2007) ‘Gender, entrepreneurial self-efficacy and
entrepreneurial career intentions: implications for entrepreneurship education’,
Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, Vol. 31, No. 3, pp.387–406.
Xavier, S.R., Kelley, D., Kew, J., Herrington, M. and Vorderwulbecke, A. (2013) Global
Entrepreneurship Monitor 2012 Global Report. [online] http://www.gemconsortium.org/
docs/download/2645 (accessed 11 November 2013).
Zhao, H., Seibert, S.E. and Hills, G.E. (2005) ‘The mediating role of self-efficacy in the
development of entrepreneurial intentions’, Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 90, No. 6,
pp.1265–1272.
 20 K.H. Looi and C. Khoo-Lattimore

Appendix

Part 1
Within the next five years or Extremely Quite Slightly Slightly Quite Extremely
so after my graduation… likely likely likely unlikely unlikely unlikely
1 I thought of starting my 1 2 3 4 5 6
own business
2 I intend to start my own 1 2 3 4 5 6
business
3 I plan to start my own 1 2 3 4 5 6
business
4 I am prepared to start my 1 2 3 4 5 6
own business

Part 2
Instruction: please tick (√) in the boxes that best describe yourself
5 My programme of study:
B. Int. Tourism Mgmt (Hons.) Travel and Recreation Mgmt
B. Int. Tourism Mgmt (Hons.) (Events Mgmt)
B. Int. Hospitality Management (Hons.)
B. Culinary Arts and Foodservice Mgmt (Hons.)
Dip. Tourism and Events
Dip. Hospitality Management
Dip. Culinary Arts
Adv. Dip. Patisserie and Gastronomic Cuisine
B.B. (Hons.) Business Administration
B.B. (Hons.) Human Resource Management
B.B. (Hons.) International Business
B.B. (Hons.) International Business and Marketing
BA. (Hons.) Accounting and Finance
B. Management (Marketing)
B. Commerce
B. Applied Finance
Diploma in Business

6 My gender: Male? Female?

7 My ethnic group: Malay? Chinese? Indian? Others (please specify) ______________
8 Is your family involved in business/businesses? Yes † No †
9 Have you studied entrepreneurship subject(s) in Taylor’s University before?
Yes † No †

View publication stats