Does Dispositional Positive and Negative Affect Predict Late-Career Entrepreneurial Intention? A Theory of Planned Behavior Perspective

Keywords: affect, late-career, entrepreneurial intention, theory of planned behavior

Abstract

Late-career entrepreneurship can be a good answer to the problems of an aging population—age discrimination experienced by mature workers or inadequate pensions. For this reason, it is gaining increasing interest among researchers and policymakers. However, to date, very little is known about the factors that favor or hinder intentions to become entrepreneur at the late-career stage, especially those taking a psychological perspective. The current study aims to fill this gap by testing whether dispositional affect is related to entrepreneurial intention at the late-career stage. To explain the mechanism of this relationship, we use the theory of planned behavior. We conducted a study that included 292 non-self-employed people aged 45–81. The results showed that neither positive affect nor negative affect are directly related to entrepreneurial intention, but these relationships are rather indirect and go through components of the theory of planned behavior. This provides insights into explanation of late-career entrepreneurial intention and can be used by researchers, policymakers and practitioners, for example in programs supporting business start-ups by people approaching retirement age.

References

Ajzen, I. (1991). The Theory of Planned Behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50, 179–211. https://doi.org/10.1016/0749-5978(91)90020-T

Ambady, N., & Gray, H. M. (2002). On being sad and mistaken: Mood effects on the accuracy of thin-slice judgments. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83(4), 947–961. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.83.4.947

Armitage, C. J., & Conner, M. (2001). Efficacy of the Theory of Planned Behaviour: A meta-analytic review. British Journal of Social Psychology, 40(4), 471–499. https://doi.org/10.1348/014466601164939

Arora, P., Haynie, J. M., & Laurence, G. A. (2013). Counterfactual thinking and entrepreneurial self-efficacy: The moderating role of self-esteem and dispositional affect. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 37(2), 359–385. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6520.2011.00472.x

Bandura, A. (1977). Self-efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological Review, 84(2), 191–215. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.84.2.191

Baron, R. A. (1998). Cognitive mechanisms in entrepreneurship. Journal of Business Venturing, 13(4), 275–294. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0883-9026(97)00031-1

Baron, R. A. (2008). The Role of Affect in the Entrepreneurial Process. Academy of Management Review, 33(2), 328–340. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.2008.31193166

Bless, H., Clore, G. L., Schwarz, N., Golisano, V., Rabe, C., & Wölk, M. (1996). Mood and the use of scripts: Does a happy mood really lead to mindlessness? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 665–679. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.71.4.665

Bohlmann, C., Rauch, A., & Zacher, H. (2017). A lifespan perspective on entrepreneurship: Perceived opportunities and skills explain the negative association between age and entrepreneurial activity. Frontiers in Psychology, 8:2015. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.02015

Bolte, A., Goschke, T., & Kuhl, J. (2003). Emotion and intuition: Effects of positive and negative mood on implicit judgments of semantic coherence. Psychological Science, 14(5), 416–421. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9280.01456

Bower, G. H. (1991). Mood congruity of social judgments. In J. P. Forgas (Ed.), Emotion and social judgments (pp. 31–53). Pergamon Press.

Cardon, M. S., Foo, M., Shepherd, D., & Wiklund, J. (2012). Exploring the heart: Entrepreneurial emotion is a hot topic. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 36(1), 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6520.2011.00501.x

Delgado García, J. B., De Quevedo Puente, E., & Blanco Mazagatos, V. (2015). How affect relates to entrepreneurship: A systematic review of the literature and research agenda. International Journal of Management Reviews, 17(2), 191–211. https://doi.org/10.1111/ijmr.12058

Fajkowska, M., & Marszał-Wiśniewska, M. (2009). Właściwości psychometryczne Skali Pozytywnego i Negatywnego Afektu – Wersja Rozszerzona (PANAS-X). Wstępne wyniki badań w polskiej próbie [Psychometric properties of the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule – Expanded Form (PANAS-X). The study on a Polish sample]. Przegląd Psychologiczny, 52, 355–388.

Foo, M.-D., Uy, M. A., & Baron, R. A. (2009). How do feelings influence effort? An empirical study of entrepreneurs’ affect and venture effort. The Journal of Applied Psychology, 94(4), 1086–1094. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0015599

Foo, M.-D., Uy, M. A., & Murnieks, C. (2015). Beyond affective valence: Untangling valence and activation influences on opportunity identification. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 39(2), 407–431. https://doi.org/10.1111/etap.12045

Forgas, J. P. (1995). Mood and judgment: The affect infusion model (AIM). Psychological Bulletin, 117(1), 39–66. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.117.1.39

Forgas, J. P. (2000). Feeling and thinking: The influence of affect on social cognition and behavior. In L. Bäckman & C. Von Hofsten (Eds.), Psychology at the turn of the millennium, Vol. 1. Cognitive, biological, and health perspectives (pp. 455–480). Psychology Press/Taylor & Francis.

Frese, M., & Gielnik, M. M. (2014). The Psychology of Entrepreneurship. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 1(1), 413–438. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-031413-091326

Fuller, C. M., Simmering, M. J., Atinc, G., Atinc, Y., & Babin, B. J. (2016). Common methods variance detection in business research. Journal of Business Research, 69(8), 3192–3198. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2015.12.008

George, J. M., & Zhou, J. (2002). Understanding when bad moods foster creativity and good ones don’t: The role of context and clarity of feelings. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87(4), 687–697. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.87.4.687

Gorgievski, M. J., Stephan, U., Laguna, M., & Moriano, J. A. (2018). Predicting entrepreneurial career intentions: Values and the theory of planned behavior. Journal of Career Assessment, 26(3), 457–475. https://doi.org/10.1177/1069072717714541

Hayes, A. (2022). Introduction to mediation, moderation, and conditional process analysis. A regression-based approach (3rd ed.). The Guilford Press.

Hayton, J. C., & Cholakova, M. (2012). The Role of Affect in the Creation and Intentional Pursuit of Entrepreneurial Ideas. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 36(1), 41–67. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6520.2011.00458.x

Johnson, E. J., & Tversky, A. (1983). Affect, generalization, and the perception of risk. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 45(1), 20–31. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.45.1.20

Kautonen, T. (2008). Understanding the older entrepreneur: Comparing Third Age and Prime Age entrepreneurs in Finland. International Journal of Business Science and Applied Management, 3, 3–13.

Kautonen, T. (2013). Senior entrepreneurship. A background paper for the OECD centre for entrepreneurship. OECD. Retrieved from https://www.oecd.org/cfe/leed/senior_bp_final.pdf

Kautonen, T., Down, S., & Minniti, M. (2014). Ageing and entrepreneurial preferences. Small Business Economics, 42(3), 579–594. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-013-9489-5

Kautonen, T., Tornikoski, E. T., & Kibler, E. (2011). Entrepreneurial intentions in the third age: The impact of perceived age norms. Small Business Economics, 37(2), 219–234. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-009-9238-y

Kautonen, T., van Gelderen, M., & Tornikoski, E. T. (2013). Predicting entrepreneurial behaviour: A test of the theory of planned behaviour. Applied Economics, 45(6), 697–707. https://doi.org/10.1080/00036846.2011.610750

Krueger, N. F., Reilly, M. D., & Carsrud, A. L. (2000). Competing models of entrepreneurial intentions. Journal of Business Venturing, 15(5), 411–432. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0883-9026(98)00033-0

Lévesque, M., & Minniti, M. (2006). The effect of aging on entrepreneurial behavior. Journal of Business Venturing, 21(2), 177–194. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusvent.2005.04.003

Liñán, F., & Fayolle, A. (2015). A systematic literature review on entrepreneurial intentions: Citation, thematic analyses, and research agenda. International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, 11(4), 907–933. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11365-015-0356-5

Loewenstein, G., & Lerner, J. S. (2003). The role of affect in decision making. In R. Davidson, H. Goldsmith, & K. Scherer (Eds.), Handbook of Affective Science (pp. 619–642). Oxford University Press.

Lortie, J., & Castogiovanni, G. (2015). The theory of planned behavior in entrepreneurship research: What we know and future directions. International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, 11(4), 935–957. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11365-015-0358-3

Lyubomirsky, S., King, L., & Diener, E. (2005). The benefits of frequent positive affect: Does happiness lead to success? Psychological Bulletin, 131(6), 803–855. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.131.6.803

Moriano, J. A., Gorgievski, M. J., Laguna, M., Stephan, U., & Zarafshani, K. (2012). A cross-cultural approach to understanding entrepreneurial intention. Journal of Career Development, 39(2), 162–185. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894845310384481

Nabi, G., & Liñán, F. (2013). Considering business start-up in recession time: The role of risk perception and economic context in shaping the entrepreneurial intent. International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, 19(6), 633–655. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEBR-10-2012-0107

OECD. (2012). Policy brief on senior entrepreneurship. entrepreneurial activities in Europe.

Pérez-Fernández, H., Delgado-García, J. B., Martín-Cruz, N., & Rodríguez-Escudero, A. I. (2022). The role of affect in the development of entrepreneurial intentions. Entrepreneurship Research Journal, 12(2), 20190124. https://doi.org/10.1515/erj-2019-0124

Pérez-Fernández, H., Martín-Cruz, N., Delgado-García, J. B., & Rodríguez-Escudero, A. I. (2020). Online and face-to-face social networks and dispositional affectivity. How to promote entrepreneurial intention in higher education environments to achieve disruptive innovations? Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 588634. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.588634

Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2012). Sources of method bias in social science research and recommendations on how to control it. Annual Review of Psychology, 63(1), 539–569. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-120710-100452

Purc, E., Łaguna, M., Laguía, A., Moriano, J. A., & Topa, G. (2021). Personal values and entrepreneurial intentions in the late-career stage. 32nd International Congress of Psychology, Prague.

Schlaegel, C., & Koenig, M. (2014). Determinants of entrepreneurial intent: A meta-analytic test and integration of competing models. Entrepreneurship: Theory & Practice, 38(2), 291–332. https://doi.org/10.1111/etap.12087

Sweida, G., & Sherman, C. L. (2020). Does happiness launch more businesses? Affect, gender, and entrepreneurial intention. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(18), 6908. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17186908

Tellegen, A., Watson, D., & Clark, L. A. (1999). On the dimensional and hierarchical structure of affect. Psychological Science, 10(4), 297–303. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9280.00157

Thompson, E. R. (2009). Individual entrepreneurial intent: Construct clarification and development of an internationally reliable metric. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 33(3), 669–694. https://doi/10.1111/j.1540-6520.2009.00321.x

United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. (2022). World population prospects 2022: Summary of results (UN DESA/POP/2022/TR/NO. 3). Retrieved from https://www.un.org/development/desa/pd/sites/www.un.org.development.desa.pd/files/undesa_pd_2022_wpp_key-messages.pdf

Wainwright, T., & Kibler, E. (2014). Beyond financialization: Older entrepreneurship and retirement planning. Journal of Economic Geography, 14(4), 849–864. https://doi.org/10.1093/jeg/lbt023

Watson, D. (2000). Mood and temperament. The Guilford Press.

Watson, D., Clark, L. A., & Tellegen, A. (1988). Development and validation of brief measures of positive and negative affect: The PANAS scales. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54(6), 1063–1070. https://doi.org/10.1037//0022-3514.54.6.1063

Wright, W. F., & Bower, G. H. (1992). Mood effects on subjective probability assessment. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 52(2), 276–291. https://doi.org/10.1016/0749-5978(92)90039-A

Published
2023-01-18
Section
Articles