Screening enterprising personality in youth: an empirical model

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Business Studies

Background:

• Entrepreneurial attitudes are influenced by cognitive, personality, and contextual factors.
• Assessing these factors is crucial for understanding and fostering entrepreneurship.

Purpose of the Study:

• To review the essential dimensions of enterprising personality.
• To develop and validate a psychometric test for assessing these dimensions.

Main Methods:

• Identification of nine dimensions: achievement motivation, risk-taking, innovativeness, autonomy, internal and external locus of control, stress tolerance, self-efficacy, and optimism.
• Development of a 127-item test administered to 416 students.
• Psychometric analyses including reliability (Cronbach's alpha), content validity (expert review), and construct validity (factorial analysis).

Main Results:

• The final 127-item test demonstrated acceptable psychometric properties with high reliability (alpha coefficients .81–.98).
• Factorial analyses supported a nine-dimensional structure and a global entrepreneurial factor, explaining 49.07% of the variance.
• Content validity was confirmed by experts (V = .71).

Conclusions:

• The developed test is a reliable and valid instrument for assessing key dimensions of enterprising personality.
• The findings provide a robust framework for understanding the multifaceted nature of entrepreneurial traits.