The Importance of Being Emotional: How do Emotions Affect Entrepreneurial Opportunity Evaluation and Exploitation?

Dietmar Grichnik , Alexander Smeja (1) , Isabell Welpe (2)

1 WHU-Otto Beisheim School of Management
2 TUM - Technische Universität Munchen - Technical University Munich - Université Technique de Munich

We examine the impact of positive (joy) and negative (fear) emotions on distinct phases of the entrepreneurial process. To analyze the effects of emotions on entrepreneurial opportunity evaluation and exploitation we use an experimental design completed by 146 participants from 40 young entrepreneurial firms. As predicted by the emotion-as-information theory and by the concept-priming theory, induced emotions change perception and decision-making of unrelated economic situations, namely entrepreneurial evaluation and exploitation. The results demonstrate that on the one hand, positive emotions affect opportunity evaluation positively and on the other hand, exploitation, negatively. Surprisingly, it is shown that negative emotionsinfluence not only opportunity evaluation, but also opportunity exploitation negatively.

Mots clés: Social Sciences & Humanities

Domaines: Économie et finance quantitative [q-fin]

Dietmar Grichnik, Alexander Smeja, Isabell Welpe. The Importance of Being Emotional: How do Emotions Affect Entrepreneurial Opportunity Evaluation and Exploitation?. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 2010, 76 (1), pp.15. ⟨10.1016/j.jebo.2010.02.010⟩. ⟨hal-00856603⟩