ABSTRACT

Opportunity beliefs lead entrepreneurs to explore or walk away from opportunities. The dominant process for explaining opportunity beliefs is structural alignment theory’s analogical problem solving of information. Information can be conceptualized according to its structure with some information presented as separate pieces of information (local) and others as aggregated information (global). We conducted an experiment with 116 upper-level managers and engineers, and found that structural and procedural similarities between technologies and socioeconomic conditions of markets drive opportunity beliefs. We found that the constraining effects of technological and socioeconomic differences on opportunity beliefs are contingent on individuals’ global versus local processing.

摘要

机会信念引导企业家探索或远离机会。解释机会信念的主要过程是结构对齐理论的信息类比问题解决。信息可以根据其结构进行概念化，其中一些信息呈现为单独的信息片段（本地），另一些信息呈现为聚合信息（全局）。我们对 116 名高层管理人员和工程师进行了一项实验，发现技术与市场社会经济条件之间的结构和程序相似性推动了机会信念。我们发现，技术和社会经济差异对机会信念的约束作用取决于个人的全球与本地处理。