A review of entrepreneurship education research in the special issues of Education plus Training journal

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to discuss the course of entrepreneurship education (EE) research within the framework of entrepreneurship. The study is based on the results of previous research published in the annual double special issues of Education + Training (E+T) journal. In this context, it examines the role of EE at different levels of education; EE interactions and approaches; the effects of the variety of variables on EE; and the grouping of these variables into clusters. Design/methodology/approach The study uses literature review to categorize 59 papers into clusters based on the associations of different variables to EE which have been extracted from the annual double special issues of E+T journal. These special issues were published during the period of 2011-2018. All the reviewed papers were empirical in nature. Findings The study has identified 47 variables from 59 empirical papers, which have been grouped into 6 clusters around EE. Based on different levels of studies such as primary, secondary and tertiary levels, the examined papers discuss a variety of variables with reference to their positive, negative, significant or non-significant relationships to EE. Originality/value The paper demonstrates the progress of the knowledge produced with regard to EE research in recent years. It is among the very few studies to focus on the discrete collection of special issue papers.