Contrary to common hopes and expectations, recent studies dispute the positive relationship between entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial intentions. An alternative view is that entrepreneurship education has a ‘sorting effect’, whereby students become more convinced about whether entrepreneurship is appropriate for them or not. Building on goal-setting theory, this study aims to shed more light on the underlying cognitive mechanism of the sorting effect by investigating whether individuals, who exhibit high ‘motivational self-knowledge’ – MSK (i.e. awareness of personal life goals and motives), make more pronounced decisions for or against entrepreneurship. At the same time, we evaluate whether entrepreneurship courses help build professional identity in the sense that motivational self-knowledge increases during the course. Our results show a positive relationship between MSK and the variance in entrepreneurial intentions; particularly when using a higher threshold for ‘high’ MSK. This finding supports the idea that goal hierarchy can be a valuable addition to dominant intention-models in studies on the formation of entrepreneurial intentions. Unfortunately, there is no significant increase in MSK for entrepreneurship students. Considering the benefits of MSK regardless of career choice, this is disappointing. We discuss possible explanations with suggestions for practitioners and formulate directions for future research.

与共同的希望和期望相反，最近的研究对创业教育与创业意图之间的积极关系提出了质疑。另一种观点是，创业教育具有“分类效应”，使学生对创业是否适合他们更加确信。本研究以目标设定理论为基础，旨在通过调查个人是否表现出很高的“动机自我知识” – MSK（即对个人生活目标和动机的意识）来进一步阐明分类效应的潜在认知机制，做出更明确的支持或反对创业的决定。同时，我们评估创业课程是否可以在过程中激发自我认识的意义上帮助建立专业形象。我们的结果表明，MSK与创业意向之间存在正相关关系。特别是当对“高” MSK使用较高阈值时。这一发现支持了这样的观点，即目标层次可以在创业意向形成研究中成为主导意向模型的宝贵补充。不幸的是，创业型学生的MSK并没有显着增加。考虑到MSK的好处，而不考虑职业选择，这令人失望。我们讨论了可能的解释，并为从业人员提供建议，并为以后的研究制定方向。这一发现支持了这样的观点，即目标层次可以在创业意向形成研究中成为主导意向模型的宝贵补充。不幸的是，创业型学生的MSK并没有显着增加。考虑到MSK带来的好处，无论其职业选择如何，这都是令人失望的。我们讨论了可能的解释，并为从业人员提供建议，并为以后的研究制定方向。这一发现支持了这样的观点，即目标层次可以在创业意向形成研究中成为主导意向模型的宝贵补充。不幸的是，创业型学生的MSK并没有显着增加。考虑到MSK的好处，而不考虑职业选择，这令人失望。我们讨论了可能的解释，并为从业人员提供建议，并为以后的研究制定方向。