Cite
Stappers, Jarno, and Petra Andries. “The Role of Distinct Adhd Symptoms for Pre-Entry Entrepreneurial Behavior: When Intentions Do Not Translate Into Action.” Small Business Economics 58, no. 3 (March 2022): 1441–57. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11187-020-00440-x.
Jeremy
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FirstAuthor:: Stappers, Jarno
Author:: Andries, Petra
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Title:: The Role of Distinct Adhd Symptoms for Pre-Entry Entrepreneurial Behavior: When Intentions Do Not Translate Into Action
Year:: 2022
Citekey:: stappersRoleDistinctAdhd2022
itemType:: journalArticle
Journal:: Small Business Economics
Volume:: 58
Issue:: 3
Pages:: 1441-1457
DOI:: 10.1007/s11187-020-00440-x
LINK
Abstract
Recent academic work and popular press advocate that individuals with symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may be particularly well equipped to conduct entrepreneurial activities. This study investigates the link between the two main symptoms of ADHD—namely, attention deficit and hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms—and pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior. Building on the person-environment fit literature and analyzing a unique dataset of Flemish individuals, it demonstrates a positive link between hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms and attention deficit symptoms on the one hand and entrepreneurial intentions on the other hand. However, it also shows that, unlike hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms, symptoms of inattentiveness hinder the transition of these intentions into actual pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior. These results imply that previous entrepreneurship research on ADHD as one single symptom is likely to be overly optimistic. .
Notes
Jeremy’s Review
This paper is a look at how people with ADHD symptoms fare in the stage of pre-entrepreneur behaviors. It is a study done in Belgium that concludes ADHD symptoms translate well to certain aspects of starting something new, such as product testing, designing, and creative thinking, but will struggle with less exciting tasks necessary to start a business such as research, bookkeeping, and administrative work. The risks seem negligible if accommodations are put into place such as broken down steps, timelines, or a partner who excels in the areas the person with ADHD does not.
Annotations
Imported: 2023-10-29 11:41 pm
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In adulthood, these symptoms form a barrier to professional success (Fletcher, 2014), being associated with lower job-performance, substandard jobs, higher risk of injury and a higher chance of becoming unemployed (Kessler et al., 2009; Verheul et al., 2015).
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- ADHD in adulthood creates barriers to gainful employment.
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academic research has started to link ADHD symptoms to a higher need for achievement and a higher ability to come up with creative ideas or solutions (Acar and Runco, 2012; White, 2018). In addition, qualitative and quantitative evidence shows that entrepreneurs with elevated ADHD symptoms have higher energy levels, and are more novelty seeking, creative, and risk-taking than entrepreneurs without these symptoms (White and Shah, 2011; Wiklund et al., 2016; Wismans et al., 2020).
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- People with ADHD have the capacity to think differently, be harder working at chasing down those ideas, and seek novel ways to do things with a lot of energy.
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We conducted a telephone survey of a representative sample of 1,052 individuals in Flanders, the northern and Dutch-speaking part of Belgium, where ADHD affects approximately 4.1 per cent of adulthood population (De Ridder et al., 2008). Mediated moderation analyses identify a positive indirect effect, as expected, between hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms and preentry entrepreneurial behavior, as well as between attention deficit symptoms and pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior, both through entrepreneurial intentions. However, the analyses als
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show that attention deficit symptoms hinder the translation of entrepreneurial intentions into pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior.
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- People with ADHD have great excitement about doing things on their own, but they have a hard time translating that into actual movement in those aspirations.
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Pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior involves multiple types of activities such as “market research, soliciting feedback on business plans, seeking out and evaluating potential suppliers, and visiting competitors” (Chen et al. 2018, p.994). Executing these pre-entry activities plays an important role in the creation of new business ventures as they are necessary to learn about the viability of the entrepreneur’s initial idea (Chen et al., 2018; Bennett and Chatterji, 2019), and to develop unique capabilities, overcome liabilities of newness and gain the thrust of constituents, thereby permitting the new venture to be perceived as legitimate (Aldrich, 1999; Delmar and Shane, 2004).
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- Pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior lays the groundwork for understanding whether or not a business will work.
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One can argue that individuals with hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms are more likely than others to display the creativity, passion, and attitudes towards independence and risk that drive entrepreneurial intentions and therefore also pre-entry entrepreneurial behaviour.
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As such, from a person-environment perspective, the characteristics and preferences of individuals with hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms fit very well with the entrepreneurial environment, implying that individuals with more hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms may have higher entrepreneurial intentions than individuals with less hyperactivity/impulsivity symptoms.
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- Someone with higher hyperactivity/impulsivity traits of ADHD are more likely to display the traits necessary to begin the entrepreneurial groundwork.
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Although empirical evidence is limited, it suggests that entrepreneurs with attention deficit symptoms can indeed concentrate intensively on activities and tasks that are exciting and interesting (Wiklund et al., 2016).
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- The ADHD trait of hyperfocus will help a budding entrepreneur thrive as they will be able to focus for something longer and more intensely than their peers.
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As a result, when it comes to starting a venture and performing associated start-up activities requiring sustained attention to details, individuals with attention deficit symptoms may quickly lose their focus on activities and task that are not challenging enough or are distracted by more stimulating or challenging activities. Furthermore, as individuals with attention deficit symptoms are known to be less proactive (Wismans et al., 2020) and to have difficulties with planning, performing tasks ‘by the book’ and fulfilling commitments (Halbesleben et al., 2013; Wiklund et al., 2016), they may experience difficulties translating their entrepreneurial intentions into pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior.
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- The fun and exciting part of starting something new will play to the strengths of someone with ADHD. However, the mundane, necessary parts of launching it into a business will be a high challenge.
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Our results confirm existing research indicating that people with more hyperactivity/impulsivity and attention deficit symptoms display higher entrepreneurial intentions (Verheul et al., 2015; Wiklund et al., 2017). However, they shed serious doubt on the common belief that these symptoms will also lead to higher degrees of entrepreneurial behavior.
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- ADHD results in high intentions to do something new, but low follow through.
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The results for individuals with attention deficit symptoms are less optimistic however. We demonstrate that inattentiveness, which characterizes about 60% of impulsive/hyperactive individuals (Skounti et al., 2007), significantly hinders the translation of entrepreneurial intentions into pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior. The hyperfocus that typically comes with attention deficit symptoms hence does not seem to help the entrepreneur in executing the broad range of activities necessary to update his/her beliefs about the business idea’s viability. Instead, inattentiveness distracts entrepreneurs from taking action.
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- The fun stuff is fun, the necessary stuff is next to impossible.
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In sum, although this study partly confirms the emerging idea that ADHD symptoms may render an individual particularly apt for entrepreneurship in general, and for decision-making under uncertainty in particular, it also demonstrates that any theoretical development that regards ADHD as one single symptom, having a positive influence on entrepreneurial intentions and decision-making, is likely to be overly simplistic.
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- ADHD can be a great help in certain situations, but to say it is a superpower is overly simplistic and overlooks the challenges that are associated with symptoms of ADHD.
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Even though the total effect of attention deficit symptoms on entrepreneurial behavior is not significant, we see that inattentive people are less able to translate their entrepreneurial intentions into actual pre-entry entrepreneurial behavior. This has practical implications, for example with respect to coaching nascent entrepreneurs with attention deficit symptoms. An explicit and extensive mapping of start-up activities and teaming up with co-founders or top management team members that take care of less exiting, routine tasks may be useful to overcome this problem.
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- As is almost always necessary for someone with ADHD, putting in accommodations will negate many of the negative effects that are caused by symptoms of ADHD.