Benjamin Powers, 2017 DBA graduate researched the Relationship among Personal-Level Variables, Entrepreneurial Self-Efficacy, and Entrepreneurial Intention: The Case of Male and Female Adolescents with Dyslexia, for his Doctoral thesis.
He explains that, “entrepreneurial intentions have been identified as a powerful predictor of new venture creation, but there is a need to better understand how background factors might affect the intention to start a new business. Several studies have indicated that females, who have shown lower levels of self-esteem compared to males, have lower entrepreneurial self-efficacy perceptions and intentions, and this negatively influences their desire to consider entrepreneurship as a career choice. Like females, students with dyslexia exhibit lower levels of self-esteem, which would be expected to negatively influence their self-efficacy perceptions and intentions.
This research investigates the effect of the personal-level variables of gender and dyslexia on entrepreneurial self-efficacy perceptions and intentions as distal antecedents to the construct of perceived behavioral control.
Based on the findings, suggestions are made to practitioners regarding factors to consider when designing entrepreneurship education curricula, including the development of both entrepreneurial competencies and confidence, the need to differentiate instruction across different student audiences (in this case, gender and dyslexia), and the opportunity to target students with entrepreneurship education before they reach the university level.”
