THE CONTRIBUTION OF UNIVERSITY ENVIRONMENTAL ELEMENTS IN NURTURING STUDENTS’ ENTREPRENEURIAL THINKING: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

Abstract

This study has two objectives, namely (1) to explore the level of entrepreneurial thinking among university students in Malaysia and Nigeria; and (2) to identify the contribution of university environmental elements in Malaysia and Nigeria in nurturing students entrepreneurial thinking. This study used a quantitative approach. The sample consists of 162 university students from Northern state of Malaysia and 92 university students from Kaduna state of Nigeria. The findings shown that both Malaysian and Nigerian university students have a moderately high level of entrepreneurial thinking, where the mean score of entrepreneurial thinking of Malaysian university students was higher than the mean score of entrepreneurial thinking of Nigerian students. All dimensions of entrepreneurial thinking, namely opportunity recognition, risk taking, tolerance of ambiguity and creativity and innovation for both countries were at a moderate level with the same mean ranking. Among the five predictors hypothesized to influence entrepreneurial thinking, four predictors, namely, co-curriculum, lecturers, curriculum and support resources contributed to 55.7% of variation in entrepreneurial thinking among university students in Malaysia. The highest environmental elements of Malaysian university that significantly contribute to student’s entrepreneurial thinking were co-curriculum, followed by lecturer curriculum and support resources. In Nigeria only two predictors, lecturers and co-curriculum contributed to 44.3% of variation in entrepreneurial thinking, where lecturers contributed the highest, followed by co-curriculum. Both countries showed that campus did not give a significant contribution to students entrepreneurial thinking. The implication of this study showed that both countries need to take entrepreneurial actions in increasing the levels of entrepreneurial thinking among university students The campus for both countries have to be more entrepreneurial to help boosted student entrepreneurial thinking.