Can Entrepreneurship Education Reduce Stereotypes Against Women Entrepreneurship?

The aim of this study is to investigate whether entrepreneurship trainings can reduce stereotypes against women entrepreneurship. With this aim socio-psychological obstacles to women entrepreneurship in Turkey are examined, and an experimental study is carried out. Entrepreneurship courses were given with a special emphasis on women entrepreneurship and gender issues. To evaluate the out puts of the experimental study, a questionnaire was designed and applied to students. In order to make a comparison, the same questionnaire was applied to students from two other universities, who have taken entrepreneurship courses through the classical method and curricula. Survey tool includes 21 statements on women entrepreneurship, 5 positive and 16 negative. A non-parametric Mann-Whitney U test was conducted to evaluate the hypothesis that the experimental group would score lower in negative statements and higher in positive statements, on the average, than the non-experimental group. Test results indicate that mean ranks for the two groups differ significantly from each other in 12 items (p<.05). Experimental group score significantly higher than the non-experimental group in 4 positive and 1 negative statements; and lower than the non-experimental group in 7 negative statements. Compared to non-experimental group, experimental group seems to have higher scoring for awareness and advocacy of women entrepreneurship and lower scoring for socio-psychological obstacles against women entrepreneurship. According to the survey results, it can be concluded that modification of entrepreneurship education curricula will contribute to reduce stereotypes hindering women entrepreneurship.