IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbvent/v34y2019i2p284-310.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Navigating the validity tradeoffs of entrepreneurship research experiments: A systematic review and best-practice suggestions

Author

Listed:
  • Grégoire, Denis A.
  • Binder, Julia K.
  • Rauch, Andreas

Abstract

Experimental methods provide important advantages for advancing academic understanding of entrepreneurship. Yet, the complex and comingled relationships between some of entrepreneurship's key characteristics pose thorny methodological challenges to entrepreneurship researchers – notably to negotiate important tradeoffs between the ideals of external and construct validity. To facilitate the sound mobilization of experimental methods in entrepreneurship research, we present an overview of critical validity challenges plaguing entrepreneurship research experiments and assess the validation practices mobilized in 144 studies using such methods. Building on these findings, we develop a practical guide of actionable validation strategies to help experimenters navigate the above tradeoffs and conduct entrepreneurship research experiments that are realistic, theoretically meaningful, and that help establish the causal effects of their focal variables. By doing so, we contribute a set of pragmatic means to support the mobilization of experimental methods for advancing entrepreneurship research.

Suggested Citation

  • Grégoire, Denis A. & Binder, Julia K. & Rauch, Andreas, 2019. "Navigating the validity tradeoffs of entrepreneurship research experiments: A systematic review and best-practice suggestions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 284-310.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbvent:v:34:y:2019:i:2:p:284-310
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusvent.2018.10.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0883902617303324
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Richard A. Bettis & Sendil Ethiraj & Alfonso Gambardella & Constance Helfat & Will Mitchell, 2016. "Creating repeatable cumulative knowledge in strategic management," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(2), pages 257-261, February.
    2. repec:eee:jbvent:v:33:y:2018:i:1:p:1-19 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Aguinis, Herman & Lawal, Sola O., 2012. "Conducting field experiments using eLancing's natural environment," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 493-505.
    4. Victor J. Friedman & Helena Desivilya, 2010. "Integrating social entrepreneurship and conflict engagement for regional development in divided societies," Entrepreneurship & Regional Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(6), pages 495-514, October.
    5. Hakan J. Holm & Sonja Opper & Victor Nee, 2013. "Entrepreneurs Under Uncertainty: An Economic Experiment in China," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(7), pages 1671-1687, July.
    6. Kahneman, Daniel & Tversky, Amos, 1979. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision under Risk," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(2), pages 263-291, March.
    7. McMullen, Jeffery S. & Kier, Alexander S., 2016. "Trapped by the entrepreneurial mindset: Opportunity seeking and escalation of commitment in the Mount Everest disaster," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 663-686.
    8. Jeffery S. McMullen & Dimo Dimov, 2013. "Time and the Entrepreneurial Journey: The Problems and Promise of Studying Entrepreneurship as a Process," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(8), pages 1481-1512, December.
    9. DeTienne, Dawn R. & Shepherd, Dean A. & De Castro, Julio O., 2008. "The fallacy of "only the strong survive": The effects of extrinsic motivation on the persistence decisions for under-performing firms," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 23(5), pages 528-546, September.
    10. Denis A. Grégoire & Andrew C. Corbett & Jeffery S. McMullen, 2011. "The Cognitive Perspective in Entrepreneurship: An Agenda for Future Research," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48, pages 1443-1477, September.
    11. Keith, Melissa G. & Harms, Peter D., 2016. "Is Mechanical Turk the Answer to Our Sampling Woes?," Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Cambridge University Press, vol. 9(1), pages 162-167, March.
    12. Daniel Bello & Kwok Leung & Lee Radebaugh & Rosalie L Tung & Arjen van Witteloostuijn, 2009. "From the Editors: Student samples in international business research," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 40(3), pages 361-364, April.
    13. Kuechle Graciela & Béatrice Boulu-Reshef & Sean D. Carr, 2016. "Prediction- and Control-Based Strategies in Entrepreneurship: The Role of Information," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) hal-01296948, HAL.
    14. Fitzsimmons, Jason R. & Douglas, Evan J., 2011. "Interaction between feasibility and desirability in the formation of entrepreneurial intentions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 431-440, July.
    15. Alvaro Cuervo-Cazurra & Ulf Andersson & Mary Yoko Brannen & Bo Bernhard Nielsen & A. Rebecca Reuber, 2016. "From the Editors: Can I trust your findings? Ruling out alternative explanations in international business research," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 47(8), pages 881-897, October.
    16. Dean A. Shepherd, 1999. "Venture Capitalists' Assessment of New Venture Survival," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 45(5), pages 621-632, May.
    17. Souitaris, Vangelis & Zerbinati, Stefania & Al-Laham, Andreas, 2007. "Do entrepreneurship programmes raise entrepreneurial intention of science and engineering students? The effect of learning, inspiration and resources," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 566-591, July.
    18. Wood, Matthew S. & Williams, David W. & Drover, Will, 2017. "Past as prologue: Entrepreneurial inaction decisions and subsequent action judgments," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 107-127.
    19. Ashish Arora & Michelle Gittelman & Sarah Kaplan & John Lynch & Will Mitchell & Nicolaj Siggelkow & Brent Goldfarb & Andrew A. King, 2016. "Scientific apophenia in strategic management research: Significance tests & mistaken inference," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(1), pages 167-176, January.
    20. Baron, Robert A., 1998. "Cognitive mechanisms in entrepreneurship: why and when enterpreneurs think differently than other people," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 13(4), pages 275-294, July.
    21. McKelvie, Alexander & Haynie, J. Michael & Gustavsson, Veronica, 2011. "Unpacking the uncertainty construct: Implications for entrepreneurial action," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 273-292, May.
    22. Corbett, Andrew C., 2007. "Learning asymmetries and the discovery of entrepreneurial opportunities," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 97-118, January.
    23. Fried, Vance H., 2003. "Defining a forum for entrepreneurship scholars," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 1-11, January.
    24. Fisher, Robert J, 1993. " Social Desirability Bias and the Validity of Indirect Questioning," Journal of Consumer Research, Oxford University Press, vol. 20(2), pages 303-315, September.
    25. Berinsky, Adam J. & Huber, Gregory A. & Lenz, Gabriel S., 2012. "Evaluating Online Labor Markets for Experimental Research: Amazon.com's Mechanical Turk," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(3), pages 351-368, July.
    26. Swee Hoon Chuah & Robert Hoffmann & Bala Ramasamy & Jonathan H. W. Tan, 2016. "Is there a Spirit of Overseas Chinese Capitalism?," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 47(4), pages 1095-1118, December.
    27. Drover, Will & Wood, Matthew S. & Fassin, Yves, 2014. "Take the money or run? Investors' ethical reputation and entrepreneurs' willingness to partner," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 29(6), pages 723-740.
    28. Cardon, Melissa S. & Zietsma, Charlene & Saparito, Patrick & Matherne, Brett P. & Davis, Carolyn, 2005. "A tale of passion: New insights into entrepreneurship from a parenthood metaphor," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 23-45, January.
    29. Woo, Sang Eun & Keith, Melissa & Thornton, Meghan A., 2015. "Amazon Mechanical Turk for Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Advantages, Challenges, and Practical Recommendations," Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(2), pages 171-179, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Entrepreneurship; Research methods; Experiments;

    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:eee:jbvent:v:34:y:2019:i:2:p:284-310. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Dana Niculescu). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jbusvent .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.