Entrepreneurship intentions of university students: exploring differences between management and engineering studentsStudents

Abstract

In the current economic context of great complexity, entrepreneurship is perceived as an alternative to create employment and reduce uncertainty, and allows the transformation of an innovative idea into a company. Entrepreneurship is a concept with many peculiarities. It is not an exact science to be implanted, but a way of thinking to be developed. It emphasizes opportunities rather than threats and obstacles, and its ability to identify opportunities requires first and foremost the study of entrepreneurial intentions of individuals (Krueger et al., 2000). What determines individual's decision to create their own business? Variables such as personal characteristics, family influence, social background, self-efficacy and others have been pointed out, but the understanding of the different motivations for someone to undertake has revealed a dynamic and complex area of study. According to Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen, 1991), individuals engage in an activity (such as starting a business) as a deliberate action which is reflected on their intention to this behaviour. The aim of the investigation is to measure and compare the entrepreneurial intentions of engineering and management students. The paper presents the results of a survey, named EMPREENDE 2017, which included 436 Portuguese students from the University of Minho. The sample focused on students from the 1st to the 3rd year of different courses at the Engineering School and the Management School at the university, divided into engineering students (49.08%) and management students (50.92%). The study does not identify differences in the entrepreneurial experience of parents but identifies differences in attitude, subjective norms, perceived control, and entrepreneurial intention of the two groups of students.