To promote entrepreneurship among students, academic institutions should focus
on developing a positive entrepreneurial personal attitude (EPA), since it is a strong
antecedent of entrepreneurial intentions, which in turn predict actual entrepreneurship.
Previous research finds that EPA is lower for women than men, which is related to
the acknowledged gap between women and men in entrepreneurial activity. The present
work builds on the elaboration likelihood model (ELM) to examine how nine
different entrepreneurship-focused academic activities in school impact on students’
EPA, paying special attention to gender differences. We use a sample of 918 students
from a French business school to analyse gender differences in the mechanisms based
on ELM central and peripheral routes to promote EPA through academic activities. Post
hoc tests are also performed to explore differences by gender at different academic
levels. The results have important implications for academic institutions wishing to
promote entrepreneurship since we unpack entrepreneurial education into
individual academic activities. In particular, results suggest that students’ gender and
academic level should be considered when designing activities to promote
entrepreneurship.
