Network to passion or passion to network? Disentangling entrepreneurial passion selection and contagion effects among peers and teams in a startup accelerator

Kai Becker; Joris J. Ebbers; Yuval Engel

doi:10.1016/j.jbusvent.2023.106299

Network to passion or passion to network? Disentangling entrepreneurial passion selection and contagion effects among peers and teams in a startup accelerator

Kai Becker^*
, Joris J. Ebbers
, Yuval Engel

^*Corresponding author for this work

Management and Organisation

Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

Abstract

Entrepreneurial passion is socially contagious. However, do entrepreneurs also select whom they interact with based on passion similarity? The complex interdependencies between social networks and entrepreneurial passion remain undertheorized and empirically puzzling. Using a stochastic actor-oriented model (SIENA) and four waves of panel data, we test hypotheses about the co-evolution of social networks and entrepreneurial passion during a 5-month startup accelerator program. We observe that social ties occur more frequently among peer entrepreneurs who are similar in levels of passion for founding. Initial homophily selection explains 34% of this observed similarity whereas social contagion explains 57%. Finally, we find that passion for founding is more contagious among members of startup teams than across other peer ties. Surprisingly, none of these effects are significant for passion for inventing. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

Original language	English
Article number	106299
Pages (from-to)	1-22
Number of pages	22
Journal	Journal of Business Venturing
Volume	38
Issue number	4
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusvent.2023.106299
Publication status	Published - Jul 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The authors thank Melissa Cardon for her excellent comments and suggestions on an earlier draft, Tom Snijders for his helpful and detailed workshop on RSIENA, and Christian Steglich for pushing the boundaries of RSIENA and making the code to separate selection and contagion effects available to us. We also thank the municipality of Amsterdam for contributing to the IXAnext project of which this study is a part of. Last, we are grateful to all study participants and Bram Kuijken for his dedication in organizing the entrepreneurship accelerator at the University of Amsterdam. This research was supported by the following research grant: The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) VENI grant awarded to Yuval Engel (016.Veni.195.133).

Funding Information:
The authors thank Melissa Cardon for her excellent comments and suggestions on an earlier draft, Tom Snijders for his helpful and detailed workshop on RSIENA, and Christian Steglich for pushing the boundaries of RSIENA and making the code to separate selection and contagion effects available to us. We also thank the municipality of Amsterdam for contributing to the IXAnext project of which this study is a part of. Last, we are grateful to all study participants and Bram Kuijken for his dedication in organizing the entrepreneurship accelerator at the University of Amsterdam. This research was supported by the following research grant: The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) VENI grant awarded to Yuval Engel (016.Veni.195.133).

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors

Funding

The authors thank Melissa Cardon for her excellent comments and suggestions on an earlier draft, Tom Snijders for his helpful and detailed workshop on RSIENA, and Christian Steglich for pushing the boundaries of RSIENA and making the code to separate selection and contagion effects available to us. We also thank the municipality of Amsterdam for contributing to the IXAnext project of which this study is a part of. Last, we are grateful to all study participants and Bram Kuijken for his dedication in organizing the entrepreneurship accelerator at the University of Amsterdam. This research was supported by the following research grant: The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) VENI grant awarded to Yuval Engel (016.Veni.195.133). The authors thank Melissa Cardon for her excellent comments and suggestions on an earlier draft, Tom Snijders for his helpful and detailed workshop on RSIENA, and Christian Steglich for pushing the boundaries of RSIENA and making the code to separate selection and contagion effects available to us. We also thank the municipality of Amsterdam for contributing to the IXAnext project of which this study is a part of. Last, we are grateful to all study participants and Bram Kuijken for his dedication in organizing the entrepreneurship accelerator at the University of Amsterdam. This research was supported by the following research grant: The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) VENI grant awarded to Yuval Engel (016.Veni.195.133).

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 8 Decent Work and Economic Growth

Keywords

Entrepreneurial passion
Peer selection
SIENA
Social contagion
Social networks
Stochastic actor-oriented model

Access to Document

10.1016/j.jbusvent.2023.106299

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Cite this

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title = "Network to passion or passion to network? Disentangling entrepreneurial passion selection and contagion effects among peers and teams in a startup accelerator",

abstract = "Entrepreneurial passion is socially contagious. However, do entrepreneurs also select whom they interact with based on passion similarity? The complex interdependencies between social networks and entrepreneurial passion remain undertheorized and empirically puzzling. Using a stochastic actor-oriented model (SIENA) and four waves of panel data, we test hypotheses about the co-evolution of social networks and entrepreneurial passion during a 5-month startup accelerator program. We observe that social ties occur more frequently among peer entrepreneurs who are similar in levels of passion for founding. Initial homophily selection explains 34\% of this observed similarity whereas social contagion explains 57\%. Finally, we find that passion for founding is more contagious among members of startup teams than across other peer ties. Surprisingly, none of these effects are significant for passion for inventing. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.",

keywords = "Entrepreneurial passion, Peer selection, SIENA, Social contagion, Social networks, Stochastic actor-oriented model",

author = "Kai Becker and Ebbers, \{Joris J.\} and Yuval Engel",

note = "Funding Information: The authors thank Melissa Cardon for her excellent comments and suggestions on an earlier draft, Tom Snijders for his helpful and detailed workshop on RSIENA, and Christian Steglich for pushing the boundaries of RSIENA and making the code to separate selection and contagion effects available to us. We also thank the municipality of Amsterdam for contributing to the IXAnext project of which this study is a part of. Last, we are grateful to all study participants and Bram Kuijken for his dedication in organizing the entrepreneurship accelerator at the University of Amsterdam. This research was supported by the following research grant: The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) VENI grant awarded to Yuval Engel (016.Veni.195.133). Funding Information: The authors thank Melissa Cardon for her excellent comments and suggestions on an earlier draft, Tom Snijders for his helpful and detailed workshop on RSIENA, and Christian Steglich for pushing the boundaries of RSIENA and making the code to separate selection and contagion effects available to us. We also thank the municipality of Amsterdam for contributing to the IXAnext project of which this study is a part of. Last, we are grateful to all study participants and Bram Kuijken for his dedication in organizing the entrepreneurship accelerator at the University of Amsterdam. This research was supported by the following research grant: The Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) VENI grant awarded to Yuval Engel (016.Veni.195.133). Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2023 The Authors",

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language = "English",

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AU - Ebbers, Joris J.

AU - Engel, Yuval

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N2 - Entrepreneurial passion is socially contagious. However, do entrepreneurs also select whom they interact with based on passion similarity? The complex interdependencies between social networks and entrepreneurial passion remain undertheorized and empirically puzzling. Using a stochastic actor-oriented model (SIENA) and four waves of panel data, we test hypotheses about the co-evolution of social networks and entrepreneurial passion during a 5-month startup accelerator program. We observe that social ties occur more frequently among peer entrepreneurs who are similar in levels of passion for founding. Initial homophily selection explains 34% of this observed similarity whereas social contagion explains 57%. Finally, we find that passion for founding is more contagious among members of startup teams than across other peer ties. Surprisingly, none of these effects are significant for passion for inventing. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

AB - Entrepreneurial passion is socially contagious. However, do entrepreneurs also select whom they interact with based on passion similarity? The complex interdependencies between social networks and entrepreneurial passion remain undertheorized and empirically puzzling. Using a stochastic actor-oriented model (SIENA) and four waves of panel data, we test hypotheses about the co-evolution of social networks and entrepreneurial passion during a 5-month startup accelerator program. We observe that social ties occur more frequently among peer entrepreneurs who are similar in levels of passion for founding. Initial homophily selection explains 34% of this observed similarity whereas social contagion explains 57%. Finally, we find that passion for founding is more contagious among members of startup teams than across other peer ties. Surprisingly, none of these effects are significant for passion for inventing. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

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KW - Peer selection

KW - SIENA

KW - Social contagion

KW - Social networks

KW - Stochastic actor-oriented model

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JO - Journal of Business Venturing

JF - Journal of Business Venturing

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M1 - 106299

ER -

Network to passion or passion to network? Disentangling entrepreneurial passion selection and contagion effects among peers and teams in a startup accelerator

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Funding

UN SDGs

Keywords

Access to Document

Persistent URL (handle)

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