1. Presented at CCSBE,Victora BC, May 2013
by
Norris Krueger, Max Planck Institute & Entrepreneurship Northwest
(thanks to great colleagues, Mellani Day,Angela Stanton, IsabellWelpe
and so many more)
Neuroentrepreneurship:
What Can Entrepreneurship Scholars
& Educators (& Practitioners) Learn
from Neuroscience?

2. Example: Libet, et.al.
(1983):
 Experimenter can detect intent almost 500
milliseconds before subject perceives it
 Suggests neurological antecedents to:
 Intentions
 Behavior
 What does this mean with regards to
antecedents of entrepreneurial intent?

3. Why Neuro-entrepreneurship?
 Behavior starts at the “neuro” level
 Current methods don’t reach this deep
 Opportunity to ask questions:
 That we could not answer before
 That we couldn’t think to ask before
 In a better way
 To get better answers then ever before

4. Latest Work such as...
 Entrepreneurship becoming focus?
 Sahakian team – 'hot' cognitions
 Wald team - dopamine

5. Nemmers Prize talk May 7, 2005
Activation in cingulate cortex & spindle cell density

6. Ultimatum games:This is your brain on unfairness

7. Herb Simon’s (1963) Levels

8. Economically-important regions of the human brain

9. Cingulate (yellow), orbitofrontal (pink),
amygdala (orange), somatosensory
(green), insula (purple)

10. Neuroeconomics has shown us
that Experimental Methods Can:
 Reveal gaps in current theory
 Lead to better specified hypotheses and
propositions (Dolan 2008).
 Identify and analyze antecedent states and
their effects upon decision-making
 Identify reflexive versus reflective behaviors
and effects

11. What can neuroscience
offer?
 Look into the “ultimate black box”
 Rigorous experimental methodologies
 Can allow us to:
 Understand deeper structures of entrepreneurial
cognition
 Map pre-decisional dynamics
 Conceptualize and measure entrepreneurial
decision-making
 Overcome “retrospective bias” and the
interactions among independent variables

12. Domains of neuroentrepreneurship
and experimental entrepreneurship
Domain of Experimental
Entrepreneurship
Neuroentrepreneurship

13. Limitations of Neuroscience
 What about group behaviors of entrepreneurs
as versus the individual?
 Complex behaviors and systems of the brain –
what are we seeing/measuring… really?
 How to control for the influence of external or
extraneous stimuli – are we measuring what
we think we are measuring?
 Learning to use the tools, methods and
procedures – a new way of thinking about the
issues (steep learning curve... turf?)

14. Interesting and relevant
discoveries thus far…
 Pre-entrepreneurial processes: affective &
cognitive reasoning
 Automatic versus Intentional Processing
(reflexive versus reflective)
 Mental prototypes – deeply held assumptions for
the good or for the bad
 Fluid intelligence – ability to solve new problems
 Change blindness – focus on the little ball…

15. Relevant issues in current
entrepreneurship research?
 Common variance bias – attributes of
entrepreneurs may indeed be correlated with
attributes of the perceived opportunities
 Dynamism of entrepreneurial processes
 Conflicting effects of independent variables
 Perceived value of opportunities

16. Neuroscience Designs as
Solutions?
 Design not just methodology proposed
 Allows for current analysis of entrepreneurial decision
process, but also…
 …controls for situational specifics of entrepreneurial
opportunities
 Researchers must develop hypotheses and test
explanations before the fact
 Modeling dynamics and causes can reveal gaps
in current theory; map dynamics of pre-
entrepreneurial decision processes

17. Where to begin? What questions
might we start with?
 Deeper cognitive structures (Mitchell, 2000)
 E.g. Detect entrepreneurial scripts and switches
(on/off)?
 When does the idea become an opportunity?
 When is that opportunity triggered as something to
act upon?
 Detecting discontinuous changes – “Aha!”

18. Potential topics for research?
 Behavioral DecisionTheory:
 Framing Effects and Paradoxes
 Preferences
 Utilities
 GameTheory
 Perceptions
 Emotions & Affect
 Affect
 Passion & Fear
 Trust
 Much, much more – applications in your area
of research

19. Conclusion
 Neuroscience methodologies and designs
have much to offer
 Could substantially advance the field of
entrepreneurship
 Exciting new world to explore and apply
 We will undoubtedly be surprised and may
very well have to change some current beliefs
and assumptions

20. Thank you!
Norris.krueger@gmail.com
@entrep_thinking (also FB, L-In)

21. Insula and low strategic IQ
 Strategic IQ (x-axis):
How much you earn
from choices &
beliefs
 Correlated (-) with
activity in L insula in
choice task
  Are overly self-
focussed people poor
strategic thinkers?

22. Overview of fMRI

23. Example: Entrepreneurial Opportunity
 Various issues in current research:
 Dependent and independent variables not
specified or confounding variables not recognized
or controlled for (Shane, 2000, 2004;
Venkataraman, 1997)
 Static versus dynamic perspective
 Opportunity characteristics not recognized or
matched with entrepreneur
 Absence of experimental approaches