Planned behaviour of tourism students’ entrepreneurial intentions in China

This research aims to investigate the influence of planned behaviour and personal variables on entrepreneurial intention in order to explain and improve low entrepreneurial intention among tourism students in China. A total of 109 tourism students were surveyed to find the key factors affecting their entrepreneurial intention by factor analysis. The six hypotheses were then tested in a sample of 267 Chinese tourism students. According to structural equation modelling (SEM), it was found that there are statistically significant relationships between personal attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavioural control and entrepreneurial intention. Multi-group analysis further showed that there are differences between personal attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioural control according to different personal variables. The results highlight the importance of taking a subdividing approach when researching the factors that influence entrepreneurial intention. Thus, we believe a number of implications about the most effective role of creating entrepreneurial atmosphere from universities, enhancing tourism students’ self-efficacy, and setting student-centred policies in promoting and developing entrepreneurial intention.