Regulatory Focus, Level of Mental Construct and Entrepreneurial Career Choice among Master Students in Abidjan

Abstract

This study examines the relationship between regulatory focus, level of mental constructs and entrepreneurial choice among students. One hundred and forty students enrolled in the Master of Law, Criminology, and Psychology, aged between 20 and 30 years of which 70 promotional and 70 preventive responded to the questionnaires of the regulative focus (Higgins et al., 2001), the identification of action (Vallacher and Wegner, 1989) and the entrepreneurial choice constructed on the basis of that of Jaskiewicz et al. (2016). The results indicate, on the one hand, that the regulatory focus and the level of mental construct significantly influence the entrepreneurial choice and, on the other hand, that abstract preventive students choose entrepreneurship more compared to concrete promotional ones. These results, explained by Trope’s theories of regulatory focus and construct level, suggest that regardless of regulatory focus, if one succeeds in stimulating an abstract mental construct level in students then one can help them prepare for entrepreneurship.