The Effect of Entrepreneurship Education on Self-Efficacy Beliefs and Entrepreneurial Intention of Nurses

Introduction: One of the most important factors in the development of entrepreneurship is education, and this has been ignored in nursing. Aim: To investigate the effect of entrepreneurship education on the self-efficacy and entrepreneurial intention of nurses. Materials and Methods: This quasi-experimental study was conducted on 76 nurses working in two hospitals in Ahvaz in 2016. Nurses working in Imam Khomeini Hospital were considered as the control group and those working in Golestan Hospital constituted the intervention group. Nurses of the intervention group were trained for three sessions in three consecutive days. Nurses in the control group did not receive any training. In both groups, Sherer self-efficacy, and Linan and Chen's entrepreneurial intention questionnaires were completed. The data collected were analysed using Chi-squared test, independent t-test and paired t-test. Results: In terms of self-efficacy belief (p=0.044) and entrepreneurial intention (p=0.047), there was a significant difference between the two groups after training, while the two groups were not significantly different before the training (p=0.619 and p=0.892). In the intervention group, there was a significant difference between the mean of self-efficacy belief (p=0.037) and entrepreneurial intention (p=0.041) before and after training, while there was no significant difference in the control group (p=0.837 and p=0.72). Conclusion: Given the findings of this study, it seems that entrepreneurship education can affect nurses' self-efficacy belief and entrepreneurship intention. More studies are recommended to be conducted though. The findings of this study can be presented as a practical guide to nursing board, hospital managers, and entrepreneurship centers.