Shelley Correll Sarah Thebaud Kim Weeden Cornell University
This research examines the extent to which social policies at the national level and cultural biases in social interactions generate and sustain the persistent pattern of gender inequality in entrepreneurship that has been observed across industrialized countries. For example, welfare state and labor market institutions may provide different opportunities and incentives for business ownership to men and women; culturally informed assumptions about gender may generate biased evaluations of female entrepreneurs? competence and commitment, and the perceived viability and innovativeness of their business ideas. Thus, the theoretical claim this research advances and evaluates is that institutional arrangements structure the overall context in which men and women perceive business ownership as a viable labor market option, whereas cognitive biases structure the social interactions through which they seek advice, legitimacy and financial support for a business endeavor. The research tests the effect of policies on gender inequality in business ownership across 25 industrialized countries by matching data on national institutions from the World Bank and the United Nations with Global Entrepreneurship Monitor survey data on entrepreneurs. The influence of cognitive bias on the evaluation of businesses will be examined with experimental vignette studies conducted at research universities in the United States and the United Kingdom. Conducting the experiments in two cultural contexts sheds light on the extent to which such biases may vary or be stable across these different cultural contexts.
This research offers new insight into the social interactional mechanisms that support aggregate patterns of gender inequality in entrepreneurship, thereby integrating the sociological concept of a multilevel gender structure with the study of entrepreneurship. If confirmed, the predictions will pioneer a new theoretical perspective on gender inequality in entrepreneurship that extends beyond personality-based arguments and builds upon human capital and network explanations. Next, this project will be the first to apply sociological theory about cognitive bias to the topic of entrepreneurship and to evaluate it in multiple cultural contexts. Lastly, the research speaks to the debate over the concept of entrepreneurship by ?gendering? the way in which innovation is analyzed.
Broader Impacts. First, this project has the potential to inform policies aimed at increasing the number of women among business owners and leaders in business innovation. For example, if the research suggests that cognitive bias influences entrepreneurship, strategies such as increasing awareness of bias on the part of financial investors and increasing publicly available information about financing sources may help accomplish this goal. Second, by conducting the research in a foreign scientific community, the project will contribute to an international dialogue about research on unconscious bias. Results will be disseminated at conferences in the US and Europe and in sociology publications. Third, hundreds of undergraduates from diverse backgrounds at universities in two countries will participate. Through the participation and debriefing process, students increase their awareness about the social issues being studied. Such exposure may also increase the likelihood that these students will consider scientific careers.
