Pathways to Academics’ Entrepreneurial Intention: A Configurational Analysis of Individual Determinants

Scholars have become interested in understanding what drives academics to pursue an entrepreneurial path, but less attention is paid to the individual-level factors that are considered the best predictors of entrepreneurial intentions among academics (AEI). Using a configurational approach, this study investigates the individual factors that influence AEI by confirming whether and under what conditions the antecedents can explain the outcomes. Fuzzy-set comparative qualitative analysis was performed to identify the causal paths that influence AEI. The results reveal multiple configurations of conditions that influence AEI. The findings show that the attitude toward entrepreneurship is a core condition that explains high AEI. This effect is obtained when a positive attitude among academics is supported by having higher self-efficacy and a mastery goal orientation. In addition, academic status (i.e., job position, job experience) can play an important role in this equation. Also, motivational factors (i.e., performance goal orientation, performance avoidance goal orientation) can lead to low AEI. This is one of the first studies to apply a configurational approach in examining different causal paths to AEI in a developing-country context. This article uses academic status, self-efficacy, goal orientation, attitude toward entrepreneurship, and academic output as conditions to identify multiple unique pathways that influence AEI.