Having Entrepreneurial Friends and Following Them? The Role of Friends’ Displayed Emotions in Students’ Career Choice Intentions

Emotions have a social effect in that individuals’ emotions, attitudes, decisions, and behavior are affected by their perceptions of others’ emotions through social interactions. We introduce the social influence of emotions perspective to the career intentions literature and demonstrate how entrepreneurial friends’ work- related emotions influence university students’ entrepreneurial career intentions. Using an experimental design (N 1⁄4 283), we reveal that entrepreneurial friends’ displayed positive emotions directly encourage students’ entrepreneurial career intentions, whereas negative emotions discourage students’ intentions indirectly by reducing the perceived desirability of being an entrepreneur. Our research contributes to the literature on career intentions, entrepreneurial intention, and emotions in the entrepreneurship context.