The Relationship Between Macroeconomic Depression And Individual Entrepreneurial Behavior

Entrepreneurship has received widespread attention from scholars and policy makers because of its ability to drive employment,especially during the economic downturn.Regarding the relationship between macroeconomics and entrepreneurship,some scholars have observed the relationship between business cycles and entrepreneurial activities at a macro level but have not reached a consistent conclusion.Other scholars have dedicated themselves to exploring entrepreneurial models and found some predictive effects of external environmental variables,but they have not yet covered Macroeconomic indicators.In order to explore this issue in depth,this study comprehensively considers the effects of macroeconomic objective economic indicators and subjective perception of the economic environment on individual entrepreneurial intentions and behaviors at the microscopic level,as well as their mediation mechanisms and boundary conditions.Specifically,the paper contains the following three studies:Study 1 used macroeconomic data from the China Bureau of Statistics(unemployment rate of each province)and 7-phase micro-level individual entrepreneurial behavior data from the CGSS and matches them(N=67447).The probit regression model was used to explore the influences of macroeconomic on individual entrepreneurial behavior.Study 2 used college students as the participants,and introduced two psychological variables of entrepreneurial motivation(necessity&opportunity)and entrepreneurial risk perception,and used regression analysis and bootstrap test to explore the impact of perceived macroeconomic environment on individual entrepreneurial intentions and the mediation mechanisms.Sub-study 1(N-305)used questionnaires to measure participants'perception of the macroeconomic environment,and sub-study 2(N=168)used experiments to assign subjects to the economic prosperity group and the recession group,and manipulated participants' perception of the macroeconomic environment with written materials.Study 3 used in-service employees as the participants,introduced employability as a moderating variable,and explored whether the macroeconomic environment has the same effect and path of influence on entrepreneurial intentions of different groups,and whether there are boundary conditions.Sub-study 1(N=160)used questionnaires to measure participants' perception of the macroeconomic environment,and sub-study 2(N=90)used experiments to assign subjects to the economic prosperity group and the recession group,and manipulated participants' perception of the macroeconomic environment with written materials.The results showed that:(1)The macroeconomic environment downturn had a positive effect on individual entrepreneurial behavior;(2)Perceived downturn in the macroeconomic environment had a positive effect on individuals' necessity entrepreneurial motivation,but it had no significant impact on individuals' opportunistic entrepreneurial motivation;(3)Entrepreneurial risk opportunity perception played a mediating role in the positive relationship between necessity entrepreneurial motivation andentrepreneurial intention;(5)Necessity entrepreneurial motivation and entrepreneurial risk opportunity perception had a chain mediation effect on the positive relationship between perception of macroeconomic downturn and entrepreneurial intention,but for employees,the effect was moderated by employability.When the individual is highly employable,the perceived macroeconomic downturn has no significant effect on the necessity entrepreneurial motivation of the individual.These research findings have enriched and expanded the application of the Theory of the Planned Behavior in the area of entrepreneurship research,and also provided theoretical and empirical evidence for how policy makers support entrepreneurs.Future research can further explore the relationship between macroeconomic environment and opportunistic entrepreneurial motivation/behavior and the boundary condition,and the internal and external contexts that affect the transformation of entrepreneurial intentions into entrepreneurial behavior.