IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ems/eureri/11557.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Overoptimism among Founders: The Role of Information and Motivation

Author

Listed:
  • Verheul, I.
  • Carree, M.A.

Abstract

This study empirically investigates factors that influence overoptimism across nascent entrepreneurs. We distinguish between two main groups of determinants (information, motivation) and three types of overoptimism (income, psychological burden, leisure time). Findings indicate that entrepreneurs who have relevant business information are more realistic and that entrepreneurs with a high level of general knowledge, acquired through education or previous (unrelated) entrepreneurial experience, are more overoptimistic. External advice and business planning do not appear to limit subsequent overoptimism. Entrepreneurs are less overoptimistic about the pecuniary or non-pecuniary benefits of self-employment when these benefits are closely related to the initial motivation for starting up the business.

Suggested Citation

  • Verheul, I. & Carree, M.A., 2008. "Overoptimism among Founders: The Role of Information and Motivation," ERIM Report Series Research in Management ERS-2008-008-ORG, Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM), ERIM is the joint research institute of the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University and the Erasmus School of Economics (ESE) at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
    • Handle: RePEc:ems:eureri:11557
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://repub.eur.nl/pub/11557/ERS-2008-008-ORG.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sarasvathy, D. K. & Simon, Herbert A. & Lave, Lester, 1998. "Perceiving and managing business risks: differences between entrepreneurs and bankers," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 207-225, January.
    2. Mathew L. A. Hayward & Dean A. Shepherd & Dale Griffin, 2006. "A Hubris Theory of Entrepreneurship," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(2), pages 160-172, February.
    3. Frédéric Delmar & Scott Shane, 2003. "Does business planning facilitate the development of new ventures?," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(12), pages 1165-1185, December.
    4. Daniel Kahneman & Dan Lovallo, 1993. "Timid Choices and Bold Forecasts: A Cognitive Perspective on Risk Taking," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 39(1), pages 17-31, January.
    5. Forbes, Daniel P., 2005. "Are some entrepreneurs more overconfident than others?," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 20(5), pages 623-640, September.
    6. Ulrike Malmendier & Geoffrey Tate, 2005. "CEO Overconfidence and Corporate Investment," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 60(6), pages 2661-2700, December.
    7. de Meza, David & Southey, Clive, 1996. "The Borrower's Curse: Optimism, Finance and Entrepreneurship," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 106(435), pages 375-386, March.
    8. Sarasvathy, Saras D., 2003. "Entrepreneurship as a science of the artificial," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 203-220, April.
    9. Becker, Gary S, 1993. "Nobel Lecture: The Economic Way of Looking at Behavior," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 101(3), pages 385-409, June.
    10. Thomas Astebro & Scott A. Jeffrey & Gordon K. Adomdza, 2007. "Inventor Perseverance after Being Told to Quit : The Role of Cognitive Biases," Post-Print hal-00476770, HAL.
    11. Madsen, Jakob Brochner, 1994. "Tests of rationality versus an "over optimist" bias," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 587-599, December.
    12. Stuart Fraser & Francis J. Greene, 2006. "The Effects of Experience on Entrepreneurial Optimism and Uncertainty," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 73(290), pages 169-192, May.
    13. Wright, Mike & Robbie, Ken & Ennew, Christine, 1997. "Venture capitalists and serial entrepreneurs," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 227-249, May.
    14. Wing Suen, 2004. "The Self-Perpetuation of Biased Beliefs," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(495), pages 377-396, April.
    15. Murray Z. Frank, 1988. "An Intertemporal Model of Industrial Exit," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 103(2), pages 333-344.
    16. Carree, Martin A. & Nijkamp, Joyce, 2001. "Deregulation in retailing: the Dutch experience," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 53(2-3), pages 225-235.
    17. Busenitz, Lowell W. & Barney, Jay B., 1997. "Differences between entrepreneurs and managers in large organizations: Biases and heuristics in strategic decision-making," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 9-30, January.
    18. Robert A. Lowe & Arvids A. Ziedonis, 2006. "Overoptimism and the Performance of Entrepreneurial Firms," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(2), pages 173-186, February.
    19. Puri, Manju & Robinson, David T., 2007. "Optimism and economic choice," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 71-99, October.
    20. Davidsson, Per & Honig, Benson, 2003. "The role of social and human capital among nascent entrepreneurs," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 301-331, May.
    21. Douglas, Evan J. & Shepherd, Dean A., 2000. "Entrepreneurship as a utility maximizing response," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 231-251, May.
    22. Norris Krueger, 1993. "The Impact of Prior Entrepreneurial Exposure on Perceptions of New Venture Feasibility and Desirability," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 18(1), pages 5-21, October.
    23. Koellinger, Philipp & Minniti, Maria & Schade, Christian, 2007. ""I think I can, I think I can": Overconfidence and entrepreneurial behavior," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 502-527, August.
    24. Yang, Sha & Markoczy, Livia & Qi, Min, 2007. "Unrealistic optimism in consumer credit card adoption," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 170-185, April.
    25. Palich, Leslie E. & Ray Bagby, D., 1995. "Using cognitive theory to explain entrepreneurial risk-taking: Challenging conventional wisdom," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 10(6), pages 425-438, November.
    26. Cooper, Arnold C. & Woo, Carolyn Y. & Dunkelberg, William C., 1988. "Entrepreneurs' perceived chances for success," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 3(2), pages 97-108.
    27. Amit, Raphael & MacCrimmon, Kenneth R. & Zietsma, Charlene & Oesch, John M., 2001. "Does money matter?: Wealth attainment as the motive for initiating growth-oriented technology ventures," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 119-143, March.
    28. Brad M. Barber & Terrance Odean, 2001. "Boys will be Boys: Gender, Overconfidence, and Common Stock Investment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 116(1), pages 261-292.
    29. Simon C. Parker (ed.), 2006. "The Economics of Entrepreneurship," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 3920.
    30. Dan Lovallo & Colin Camerer, 1999. "Overconfidence and Excess Entry: An Experimental Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(1), pages 306-318, March.
    31. Wellington, Alison J., 2006. "Self-employment: the new solution for balancing family and career?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 357-386, June.
    32. Brenner, Lyle A. & Koehler, Derek J. & Liberman, Varda & Tversky, Amos, 1996. "Overconfidence in Probability and Frequency Judgments: A Critical Examination," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 65(3), pages 212-219, March.
    33. Barton H. Hamilton, 2000. "Does Entrepreneurship Pay? An Empirical Analysis of the Returns to Self-Employment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(3), pages 604-631, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Viktorija Ilieva & Thomas Brudermann & Ljubomir Drakulevski, 2018. "“Yes, we know!” (Over)confidence in general knowledge among Austrian entrepreneurs," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(5), pages 1-15, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Martin Carree & Ingrid Verheul, 2012. "What Makes Entrepreneurs Happy? Determinants of Satisfaction Among Founders," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 371-387, April.
    2. Oliver Thomas, 2018. "Two decades of cognitive bias research in entrepreneurship: What do we know and where do we go from here?," Management Review Quarterly, Springer, vol. 68(2), pages 107-143, April.
    3. Joon Mahn Lee & Byoung‐Hyoun Hwang & Hailiang Chen, 2017. "Are founder CEOs more overconfident than professional CEOs? Evidence from S&P 1500 companies," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(3), pages 751-769, March.
    4. Christopher Dawson & David de Meza & Andrew Henley & G. Reza Arabsheibani, 2014. "Entrepreneurship: Cause and Consequence of Financial Optimism," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(4), pages 717-742, December.
    5. Cucchiarini, Veronica & Scicchitano, Sergio & Viale, Riccardo, 2024. "The Entrepreneur's Cognitive and Behavioral Journey: Understanding Heuristics and Bias under Risk and Uncertainty," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1390, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    6. John S. Chen & David C. Croson & Daniel W. Elfenbein & Hart E. Posen, 2018. "The Impact of Learning and Overconfidence on Entrepreneurial Entry and Exit," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(6), pages 989-1009, December.
    7. Gary Dushnitsky, 2010. "Entrepreneurial Optimism in the Market for Technological Inventions," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(1), pages 150-167, February.
    8. Cédric Gutierrez & Thomas Åstebro & Tomasz Obloj, 2020. "The Impact of Overconfidence and Ambiguity Attitude on Market Entry," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(2), pages 308-329, March.
    9. Hédia Fourati & Rihab Ben Attitalah, 2018. "Entrepreneurial Optimism, The Nature Of Entrepreneurial Experience And Debt Decision For Business Start-Up," International Journal of Innovation Management (ijim), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 22(03), pages 1-26, April.
    10. Robert A. Lowe & Arvids A. Ziedonis, 2006. "Overoptimism and the Performance of Entrepreneurial Firms," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(2), pages 173-186, February.
    11. Simon, Mark & Shrader, Rodney C., 2012. "Entrepreneurial actions and optimistic overconfidence: The role of motivated reasoning in new product introductions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 291-309.
    12. Rietveld, C.A. & Groenen, P.J.F. & Koellinger, Ph.D. & van der Loos, M.J.H.M. & Thurik, A.R., 2013. "Living Forever: Entrepreneurial Overconfidence at Older Ages," ERIM Report Series Research in Management ERS-2013-012-STR, Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM), ERIM is the joint research institute of the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University and the Erasmus School of Economics (ESE) at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
    13. Martin Koudstaal & Randolph Sloof & Mirjam van Praag, 2015. "Are Entrepreneurs more Optimistic and Overconfident than Managers and Employees?," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 15-124/VII, Tinbergen Institute.
    14. Indy Bernoster & Cornelius A. Rietveld & A. Roy Thurik & Olivier Torrès, 2018. "Overconfidence, Optimism and Entrepreneurship," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-14, June.
    15. Gudmundsson, Sveinn Vidar & Lechner, Christian, 2013. "Cognitive biases, organization, and entrepreneurial firm survival," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 278-294.
    16. Michael Fritsch & Alina Rusakova, 2010. "Personality Traits, Self-Employment, and Professions," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 343, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    17. Dubard Barbosa, Saulo & Fayolle, Alain & Smith, Brett R., 2019. "Biased and overconfident, unbiased but going for it: How framing and anchoring affect the decision to start a new venture," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 528-557.
    18. Mingfeng Tang & Hao Huang & Grace Walsh & Maribel Guerrero, 2023. "The impact of entrepreneurial overconfidence on incubator effectiveness," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 48(1), pages 416-440, February.
    19. Robin M. Hogarth & Natalia Karelaia, 2012. "Entrepreneurial Success and Failure: Confidence and Fallible Judgment," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 23(6), pages 1733-1747, December.
    20. Philipp Koellinger & Theresa Treffers, 2015. "Joy Leads to Overconfidence, and a Simple Countermeasure," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(12), pages 1-22, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    information; motivation; nascent entrepreneurs; overoptimism;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • M - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics
    • M13 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - New Firms; Startups
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ems:eureri:11557. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: RePub (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/erimanl.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.