Background of the Study

Entrepreneurship education is a key driver of sustainable socio-economic growth, promoting innovation, creativity, and efficient task execution through commitment and initiative (Klinger & Schundeln, 2011; Acs et al., 2008). It focuses on enhancing entrepreneurial skills and competencies, enabling graduates to start and succeed in their own ventures (Blenker et al., 2014). This education fosters critical abilities like creativity, problem-solving, and communication, which, along with practical experience, are vital for entrepreneurial success (Murphy & Dyrenfurth, 2012).

In growing countries, constrained task opportunities for graduates propose an enormous challenge. While universities produce skilled graduates capable of excelling in public and private sectors, job markets often cannot absorb them all, leading to rising unemployment and socio-economic imbalances (Brown, 2003; Okorafor & Okorafor, 2011).

Entrepreneurship has emerged as a viable solution to address these challenges. Research highlights its role in creating self-employment and reducing unemployment, with entrepreneurship education playing a crucial role in preparing individuals to capitalize on opportunities and adapt to market needs (Peterman & Kennedy, 2003).

Given the increasing focus on entrepreneurship by policymakers, universities, and practitioners, there is a growing need for empirical research in this area (Sanchez, 2011). This study aims to contribute to the field by examining the impact of university-level entrepreneurship education on entrepreneurship development in Pakistan, a non-Western context with unique cultural and organizational dynamics.

Objectives of the Study

This study investigates the role of university-level entrepreneurship education in fostering entrepreneurship development, focusing on students from the Management Sciences department at BUITEMS. The objectives are:

1. To evaluate how generalized entrepreneurial education influences entrepreneurship development.

2. To assess the impact of motivational entrepreneurial education on entrepreneurship development.

3. To examine the role of augmented entrepreneurial education in entrepreneurship development.

Significance of the Research

The research addresses a gap in the literature by exploring entrepreneurship education's impact within the cultural and economic context of a developing country, Pakistan. Most prior studies focus on Western, industrialized settings, limiting their applicability to non-Western contexts.

Theoretical Contributions: The study extends the current body of knowledge by testing the generalizability of findings from existing literature in a culturally distinct and under-researched environment.

Practical Implications: The results offer actionable insights for policymakers and practitioners to design effective entrepreneurship education programs tailored to local needs, highlighting their potential to enhance entrepreneurship development among university students.

This section provides a deep theoretical base of study. The literature review examines a critique view of different authors on entrepreneurial education and its impact on entrepreneur development in universities. Researchers stated that there are three types of entrepreneurial education which include generalized entrepreneurial education, motivational entrepreneurial education, and augmented entrepreneurial education. This chapter provides a brief overview of these three entrepreneurial educations and their impact on the entrepreneurial development of university students.

Definition of the Concept of Entrepreneurship

The concept of entrepreneurship can be defined as follows about definition proposed by several different researchers in multiple disciplines:

“In simple form, it is an energetic and self-motivated process of change that ultimately translates into the creation of marketable products and services. The process required an application of enthusiasm and passion for the formulation and implementation of innovative ideas and solutions in the marketplace. For successful implementation, team formulation consisting of different ventures, undertaking of risks, utilization of efforts and resources, efficient and effective business plan along with utilization of key skills and capabilities and abilities to explore advantageous opportunities are necessary (Kuratko & Hodgetts, 2009). Initially, the educational institution should revise its course structure to promote and enhance entrepreneurial development at the national level. Additionally, entrepreneurial culture should be fostered at the organizational level to enhance the behavior of both managers as well as employees concerning entrepreneurial activities within an organization (Krackhardt, 1995; Welsch, 2003).

Entrepreneurship Theories and Models

There is a need for strong theoretical support for the present study of entrepreneurship development. Several theories support the concept of entrepreneurship education and its development some basic theories are given below:

The evolution of entrepreneurship studies and research was started over the last few years. Now it has become one of the important and most discussed topics in research. Some schools of thought prevail in the market and also explain a shift from positivist epistemology to the new school of thought more constructive epistemology (Bygrave & Hofer, 1991).

Entrepreneurship Schools of Thought

Classifying different philosophers into different schools of thought was a problem that occurred a long time before and it has been recognized as an important discipline.

There are various similarities and differences among entrepreneurship theories which were the cause of the new school of thought development (Elias & Merriam, 1980).

According to Cunningham and Lischeron (1991), there are six schools of thought. They described that entrepreneurship is a multi-faceted phenomenon. There are different dimensions offered by these schools of thought. In order to understand the concept of entrepreneurship it is important that the researcher should take an interest in each dimension process (Cunningham & Lischeron, 1991)

Theory of Planned Behaviour

The theory of planned behavior is one of the important behavioral theories introduced by Ajzen and Fishbein in 1980 and is classified as one of the most important and popular entrepreneurship theories for students. The modified theory of planned behavior is the theory of reasoned action given by Sheppard et al (1988) who stated that our every action is based on some intention or some reason (Shapero, 1972; Krueger, 1993). This theory explains that the intention of entrepreneurship stems from the opinion of the desirability and feasibility of a person and this relation is affected by social and cultural context. This model contains some variables of attitude toward behavior and perceived behavior control which is affected by subjective norms (Turker et al.2009). These attitudes, and social norms have a greater impact on student intention of entrepreneurship which causes motivational behavior of students toward thinking about new ventures (Autio, Keeley, Klofsten, Parker& Hay, 2001)

Theory of Achievement

A theory given by McClelland in 1961 is one of the most used theories on entrepreneurship development among students is the "Theory of Achievement". Individuals perform higher and engage them in challenging and innovative tasks that have a strong need for achievement. This individual looks for improved ways of achievement, success, and a higher level of performance (Utsch & Rauch, 2000; Littunen, 2000). According to McClelland's theory, moderate risk is required in a business's initial stages. It is important that an individual is a moderate risk taker, pays attention to the supervisory response of profit and cost, assumes personal responsibility, and finds innovative and creative ways of new product and service development. The theory also states that those characteristics prevail in the individual who has a high need for motivation and achievement (Raposo, do Paco & Ferreira, 2008). McClelland's theory of achievement shows a unique type of "Entrepreneurship personality" which includes the need for affiliation, power, and achievement.

Entrepreneurship Education

This section provides entrepreneurship education reviews and why it is needed in the current situation, what steps can be taken to encourage women as well in entrepreneurship development.

Definition of Entrepreneurship Education and its Chronology

The main variable of the current study is entrepreneurship education and its encouragement. Entrepreneurship education is defined as “the educational system, whole set of training and education activities”. Entrepreneurship education is one of the methods through which university can encourage their students to think outside of the box and it is an activity that creates graduates intention to perform entrepreneurial behavior. Some factors highly influence entrepreneurs which include entrepreneurial activities, desirability, knowledge, and feasibility (Linan, 2004). Katz, 2003 developed the chronology of entrepreneurship education in 2003.

It started dating back to 1876 with agricultural and economic literature and it was included in hardware courses literature in 1947.

Emergence of Women Entrepreneurs in Pakistan

Fostering female entrepreneurial ventures is pivotal for Pakistan’s economic growth and inclusion agenda. Access to financial services is an imperative constituent of initiating and growing a business for female entrepreneurs. Usually, women-owned businesses are small/cottage industries in their homes. Therefore, microfinance products should serve as a facilitator for start-up and working capital finance for this clientele. Microfinance portfolio data reveals that despite improvements in outreach to women in Pakistan’s microfinance sector, it still lags behind its regional peers with a mere 59% female clientele (Safavian & Haq, 2013).

Pakistan’s female participation rate in the labor force stands at a mere 28%. More than 80% of women in Pakistan blame household duties and lack of education as the major reasons for their non-participation in the labor force (The Nation, 2012; World Bank, 2012).

Government Steps for Entrepreneurship Development

Even more shocking is the fact that loans are more frequently passed on in programs that lend exclusively to women. This practice is higher in NGOs than in microfinance banks (MFBs), and higher in urban areas than in rural areas. In addition, the presence of credit information bureaus (CIBs) is also to blame for this situation though indirectly. As an inadvertent consequence of CIBs men who have previously defaulted on their payments, use women to access credit (Safavian & Haq, 2013).

Against this milieu (backdrop), access to finance remains the greatest challenge for female entrepreneurs who intend to initiate and grow a business. A vast majority of female entrepreneurs in Pakistan are involved in traditional business activities and still depend heavily on informal sources of finance like savings, loans from family members, or the sale of assets.

Generalized Entrepreneurial Education and Entrepreneurship Development

Ages ago it was widely believed that entrepreneurial qualities are inherently embedded within an individual at the time of birth instead of developing them at later stages by focusing on and utilizing entrepreneurial education in the field (Gnyawali & Fogel, 1994). Nowadays this trend has significantly changed. The researchers in the area of entrepreneurship are of the view that entrepreneurship education at the university level can enhance entrepreneurship qualities among individuals. Moreover, entrepreneurship education enabled the creation of certain new traits regarding entrepreneurship among individuals too (Henderson & Robertson, 2000). Past studies consistently reported that entrepreneurial qualities exist inherently in every human being. In other words, the potential of entrepreneurship exists in every individual to some extent (Wilson et al., 2009).

Hence attitudes and behaviors of individuals are shaped towards entrepreneurship by focusing on generalized entrepreneurial education as entrepreneurial education is all about learning for entrepreneurship, learning about entrepreneurship, and learning through entrepreneurship (Gibb & Hannon, 2006). As a whole, generalized entrepreneurial education significantly and positively influences the career choice of students at the university level. Moreover, owning businesses has been preferred by a high proportion of entrepreneurial students at the university level exhibiting the importance of generalized entrepreneurial education in entrepreneurship development (Mogollon & Rubio, 2010; Kelley & Thomas, 2011). Based on the preceding discussion following hypothesis is formulated that will be tested in the present study:

Hypothesis 1: Generalized entrepreneurial education will be positively associated with entrepreneurship development among students at the university level.

Motivational Entrepreneurial Education and Entrepreneurship Development

In today’s turbulent business environment, entrepreneurship has not been considered the first choice of career during the initial stage of career selection by recently graduated students (Ronstadt, 1985; Fishbein & Ajzen, 2010).

Past studies consistently argued that there is a need to develop self-determination among individuals at the university level for the purpose of motivating them to start up their own new businesses after completion of education (Shane et al., 2003). It is widely believed that the attitudes of individuals can be shaped towards entrepreneurship as the approved behaviors of successful individuals and mentors are generally followed by individuals both in positive and negative circumstances that vary across time. Hence it is argued that an individual intention to pursue entrepreneurship as a career in the near future can be influenced by having interaction with the entrepreneurs of the related area (Li et al., 2008; Fishbein & Ajzen, 2010).

All these factors hinder the career choices of graduates in terms of engaging in entrepreneurial careers (Owusu-Ansah, 2012). Past studies in the area of entrepreneurship also reported significant and positive contributions of motivational entrepreneurial education in entrepreneurship development among students at the university level as motivational entrepreneurship education motivates the student to seek challenges in the marketplace, take initiative for the fulfillment of desired set goals and a gateway from the concept of the glass ceiling at the corporate level (Kelley & Thomas, 2011). Thus motivational entrepreneurial education significantly influences entrepreneurship development among students at the university level by motivating and encouraging graduates to the new business enterprises creation to make them job creators instead of job seekers in the market (Wilson et al., 2007). Based on the preceding discussion following hypothesis is formulated that will be tested in the present study:

Hypothesis 2: Motivational entrepreneurial education will be positively associated with entrepreneurship development among students at the university level.

Augmented Entrepreneurial Education and Entrepreneurship Development

For entrepreneurship, Self-efficacy is another important requirement (Wilson et al., 2007). Bandura (1995) explained self-efficacy/ augmented entrepreneurship education as a belief in a person’s capabilities to execute and organize the course of action which are required to manage the situation prevailing in the organization”. Bandura emphasized that community experiences, observational learning, and reciprocal determinism significantly shape an individual's personality. He also highlighted that a person’s abilities, cognitive skills, and attitudes form the " Self-mechanism," which plays an essential position in figuring out how individuals understand and reply to diverse conditions. For fostering a robust self-system and self-efficacy, greater entrepreneurship education, in addition to motivational and general entrepreneurial education, is essential.

While motivational and general entrepreneurial education has shown a positive impact on entrepreneurship development, research indicates that only a small number of students who take entrepreneurship courses at the graduate level pursue careers as entrepreneurs. Ronstadt (1985) argued that motivational and general entrepreneurship education alone are insufficient for fostering entrepreneurship development, and an advanced level of entrepreneurship education is necessary.

Given this context, augmented entrepreneurial education is considered a vital component for promoting entrepreneurial development among university students. To achieve this goal, universities should go beyond traditional education by offering innovative programs such as opportunity recognition, creative problem-solving, leadership development, community collaboration, bureaucratic navigation, and presentation skills. These programs can enhance students' entrepreneurial intentions (Marques and Albuquerque, 2012).

Hypothesis 3: Augmented entrepreneurial education has a positive relationship with entrepreneurship development among university students.

Conceptual Framework and Hypothesis Development

Based on the detailed review of the literature along with a comprehensive investigation of models and theories of entrepreneurship, the following conceptual framework has been proposed that the present study aims to answer. The present study examines the effects of entrepreneurial education on entrepreneurship development among students at the university level. All three dimensions of entrepreneurial education are investigated in the present study. Therefore the conceptual framework mainly comprises three dimensions of entrepreneurial education and its impact on entrepreneurship development. In the framework for the present study, generalized, motivational, and augmented entrepreneurship education is treated as an independent variable whereas entrepreneurship development is treated as the dependent variable.

Conceptual Framework and Hypothesis Development

Based on an extensive review of the literature and a thorough examination of entrepreneurship models and theories, this study proposes a conceptual framework to address its research objectives. The study focuses on analyzing the impact of entrepreneurial education on entrepreneurship development among university students. It specifically explores three dimensions of entrepreneurial education: generalized, motivational, and augmented. In this framework, entrepreneurial education serves as the independent variable, while entrepreneurship development is the dependent variable. The framework is adapted from the work of Hassan, Khan, and Noor Un Nabi (2017).

Research Design

The study adopts a causal research design to empirically examine the relationships between the variables. It investigates how the three dimensions of entrepreneurial education—generalized, motivational, and augmented—affect entrepreneurial development among university students. The study relies on participants’ self-reported perceptions to measure the variables, aiming to provide actionable insights for both academic researchers and practitioners in the field of entrepreneurship.

Study Setting

The study was conducted as a field study, examining the causal relationships between entrepreneurial education dimensions and entrepreneurship development. Data were collected from management science students at BUITEMS University in Quetta, Balochistan, within their natural work and learning environments.

Measurement scales

Entrepreneurial Education (Armstrong, 1987)

? Generalized Entrepreneurial Education

? Motivational Entrepreneurial Education

? Augmented Entrepreneurial Education

The data collection for this study involved two primary methods: direct contact and online distribution via email and social media platforms. Questionnaires were distributed in person to management sciences students at BUITEMS University in Quetta, Balochistan. Additionally, a digital version of the questionnaire was created using Google Forms and shared through social media channels such as WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, and Viber. While the response rate from online participants was relatively low, the researcher compensated by collecting the remaining responses through direct interaction with the students. Participants were informed that completing the questionnaire would take approximately ten minutes, and detailed explanations were provided as needed to encourage maximum participation.

Data Analysis Methods/Procedures

The study employs causal analysis to examine the relationships between the variables. Given the presence of multiple independent variables, parametric tests were used to measure associations, with "Multiple Regression Analysis" as the primary method. Additionally, various analyses were performed, such as descriptive evaluation, normality trying out, reliability evaluation, correlation evaluation, and multiple regression evaluation, to discover the proposed relationships comprehensively. The primary focus of the study’s analysis lies in examining the "Main Effect Results," which assess the impact of generalized, motivational, and augmented entrepreneurship education on entrepreneurship development.

Demographic Analysis

Demographic analysis was conducted to describe the characteristics of the study sample. This analysis considered variables such as gender, age, education level, and monthly income of the respondents, providing a detailed profile of the participants and aiding in contextualizing the findings of the study.

The study explored whether generalized entrepreneurship education (broad, foundational knowledge and skills) positively impacts entrepreneurship development. Contrary to expectations, this hypothesis was rejected, as the findings indicated no significant relationship (? = 0.064, p = 0.289). These results diverge from prior studies, which found such education positively influenced entrepreneurship development. The cultural and organizational differences in Pakistan may explain the discrepancy. Despite this, generalized education can help cultivate entrepreneurial attitudes and competencies. However, the lack of immediate relevance to Pakistan's non-Western context led to the observed insignificant results.

The study confirmed a positive relationship between motivational entrepreneurship education (education fostering initiative, goal-setting, and entrepreneurial aspirations) and entrepreneurship development (? = 0.333, p < 0.01). This finding aligns with prior research, emphasizing how motivational education equips students to overcome barriers, explore opportunities, and pursue entrepreneurial careers. Family and institutional encouragement also play a key role. The study reinforces the importance of motivational education in linking entrepreneurial intentions with actionable behaviors.

The research also validated the positive influence of augmented entrepreneurship education (programs beyond traditional curricula that develop creativity, problem-solving, leadership, and community engagement) on entrepreneurship development (? = 0.416, p < 0.01). This aligns with earlier studies, showing that innovative, skill-based programs enhance students’ entrepreneurial intentions by preparing them for real-world challenges. These findings highlight the role of augmented education in boosting entrepreneurial readiness and capability.

The present study examined the impact of entrepreneurial education at the university level on entrepreneurship development at BUITMS University, Pakistan. Each dimension of entrepreneurship education involving generalized entrepreneurship education, motivational entrepreneurship education, and augmented entrepreneurship education was investigated about entrepreneurship development. The present study supports the findings of previous research in the area of entrepreneurial education and entrepreneurship development.

The present study examined the impact of entrepreneurial education at the university level on entrepreneurship development at BUITMS University, Pakistan. Each dimension of entrepreneurship education related to generalized entrepreneurship education, motivational entrepreneurship education, and augmented entrepreneurship education was investigated about entrepreneurship development. The current study supports the findings of previous research in the area of entrepreneurial education and entrepreneurship development.

Primary data has been used by the study to investigate the consequences of entrepreneurial education at the university level on entrepreneurship development among students. An adapted questionnaire was employed to collect data for the study. The sample of the study was 203 management sciences students of BUITMS University operated in Quetta, Baluchistan. There were 3 hypotheses 2 hypotheses were accepted n and one hypothesis was rejected. The rejected hypothesis has an insignificant relationship due to cross-cultural and organizational differences. Thus, positive entrepreneurship education at the university level can enhance entrepreneurship qualities among people. Hence positive entrepreneurial attitudes and behaviors may evolve among students towards small and medium business enterprises by means of focusing successfully on entrepreneurial education at the university level, in particular in developing economies like Pakistan.

The study provides critical insights for universities and policymakers to design education systems that foster entrepreneurial competencies. It suggests tailoring educational approaches to cultural and organizational contexts, emphasizing motivational and augmented programs to effectively nurture entrepreneurship.

The chapter concludes with the study’s limitations, such as its focus on a non-Western context and reliance on university-level data, and calls for future research to explore broader contexts, diverse educational systems, and longitudinal impacts of entrepreneurship education.