The Association between Entrepreneurial Perceived Behavioral Control, Personality, Empathy, and Assertiveness in a Romanian Sample of Nascent Entrepreneurs

Abstract

In today’s global context, entrepreneurship is recognized as the engine of sustainable economic growth, competitiveness and employment in the economy of any nation. In order to improve the measures aimed at encouraging the creation of new businesses, an enhanced understanding of the drivers of nascent entrepreneurship seems essential. Drawing on planned behavior theory and the approach of entrepreneurial perceived behavioral control (PBC) as a motivational antecedent in starting a new business, the current study seeks to understand how the personal characteristics of the entrepreneurs influence entrepreneurial PBC. Three types of characteristics were assessed in a sample of 212 Romanian nascent entrepreneurs: personality traits (Big Five model), empathy, and assertiveness. The hierarchical multilinear regression analysis, in which entrepreneurial PBC was treated as a dependent variable, showed that the model with the highest explanatory power for the variance of results of entrepreneurial PBC included characteristics from all three levels: personality traits—Neuroticism, Extraversion, and Openness; empathy—personal distress and perspective-taking; and adaptive assertiveness. Additionally, the findings showed that adaptive assertiveness provides an effect over and above personality factors and empathy on the entrepreneurial PBC. The practical implications of these findings indicate that to enhance the effectiveness of entrepreneurship education programs, components aiming to enhance internal personal resources of entrepreneurs (such as assertive communication skills) should be added.