Aparicio, Gloria; Iturralde, Txomin; Maseda, Amaia

Article
Conceptual structure and perspectives on
entrepreneurship education research: A bibliometric
review

European Research on Management and Business Economics (ERMBE)

Provided in Cooperation with:

European Academy of Management and Business Economics (AEDEM), Vigo (Pontevedra)

Suggested Citation: Aparicio, Gloria; Iturralde, Txomin; Maseda, Amaia (2019) : Conceptual
structure and perspectives on entrepreneurship education research: A bibliometric review,
European Research on Management and Business Economics (ERMBE), ISSN 2444-8834,
Elsevier, Amsterdam, Vol. 25, Iss. 3, pp. 105-113,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iedeen.2019.04.003

This Version is available at:

http://hdl.handle.net/10419/205793

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use:

Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your
Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes.

Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle You are not to copy documents for public or commercial
Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them
machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise
use the documents in public.
Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen
(insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, If the documents have been made available under an Open
gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you
genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated
licence.

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
 European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113

www.elsevier.es/ermbe

Conceptual structure and perspectives on entrepreneurship education

research: A bibliometric review
Gloria Aparicio, Txomin Iturralde ∗ , Amaia Maseda
University of the Basque Country, UPV/EHU

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This study aims to review the field of Entrepreneurship Education (EE). The review examines 325 scientific
Received 27 December 2018 articles published in refereed scientific journals from 1987 to 2017. The SciMat software was used to
Received in revised form 9 April 2019 conduct an analysis of performance indicators and science mapping visualizations. The performance
Accepted 10 April 2019
analysis results identified some of the field’s most active and influential articles, journals, and authors.
Available online 20 June 2019
The science mapping visualization of co-word analysis results revealed EE research evolution. In general,
we found that EE research has evolved from EE as part of an economic development strategy to the EE
JEL classification:
academic perspective. Furthermore, research themes showed that students, rather than teachers, have
M1
I23
become the main agents of the educational process. The results of this bibliometric analysis enhance
understanding of the evolution of EE research with a global overview of the relevant literature and its
Keywords: authors.
Entrepreneurship education © 2019 AEDEM. Published by Elsevier España, S.L.U. This is an open access article under the CC
Entrepreneurial intention BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Entrepreneurial learning
Bibliometrics
SciMat

1. Introduction that such educational programs improve attitudes and overall

entrepreneurial activity and that inspiration (i.e., a construct con-
The growth of research on entrepreneurship education (EE) and taining an emotional element) is the most influential EE benefit
the associated research on the impact of EE has resulted in interest- (Souitaris, Zerbinati, & Al-Laham, 2007).
ing challenges for institutions delivering EE, as well as supporting EE research has grown rapidly (Kassean, Vanevenhoven, Liguori,
organizations. Following the most important research areas in Busi- & Winkel, 2015) and has attracted the attention of many renowned
ness and Management, as classified by Diez-Martín (2018), the researchers. Several authors have helped increase EE knowledge
research about EE is included in the areas of “skills and employ- by publishing literature reviews in academic journals. A literature
ability” and “managing complexity”. Management and Business review engages researchers and practitioners not only by providing
Faculties and Business Schools could have the strongest orienta- a transparent auditing trail for legitimizing the order and flow of
tion to entrepreneurship in their educational programs but EE is not articles, but also by highlighting and updating the EE landscape.
only important in Higher Education. Thus, the existing EE research Articles by Mwasalwiba (2010) and Nabi, Linan, Fayolle, Krueger,
is broad both in levels of education and educational disciplines, and Walmsley (2017) are particularly interesting due to their global
accordingly this literature review will not limit the analysis to one perspective on EE research and practice.
specific discipline or level of education. Mwasalwiba (2010) conducted a semi-systematic literature
Although there are no definitive findings regarding the link review of 108 articles, categorizing them according to educa-
between EE and entrepreneurial activities, a significant amount tional objectives, target audiences, community outreach activities,
of research suggests this association and there is great interest in applied teaching methods, and impact indicators, and then assess-
this research area (Fernández-Portillo, 2018). Results have shown ing the alignment between each of these aspects. The review
showed that at that time, EE was not a developed field. Despite
the large number of articles written from the perspective of many
different stakeholders, including policymakers, academics, and stu-
∗ Corresponding author. Departamento de Economía Financiera II,. Lehendakari
dents, there was no universal agreement as to the important themes
Agirre, 83, University of the Basque Country, UPV/EHU, E48015 Bilbao, Spain. Tel.:
that defined EE in practice. However, the review also showed
+34 94 6013811.
E-mail addresses: [email protected] (G. Aparicio), that the field was moving toward a common conceptual approach
[email protected] (T. Iturralde), [email protected] (A. Maseda). demonstrated by agreement on educational objectives and

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iedeen.2019.04.003
2444-8834/© 2019 AEDEM. Published by Elsevier España, S.L.U. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-
nd/4.0/).
106 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113

recommended teaching methods (as opposed to those most 2. Methodology

frequently applied) and convergence on behavioral impact
indicators. The methodological design for this study’s bibliometric analysis
To identify the impact of EE on a range of entrepreneurial out- involves two phases, document source selection and bibliometric
comes in higher education, Nabi et al. (2017) analyzed 159 articles analysis. The steps for each are detailed in the following sections.
published between 2004 and 2016. They found that research on
EE impact still predominantly focuses on measurements of short- 2.1. Document source selection
term and subjective outcomes and tends to severely under describe
the actual pedagogies currently being tested. The study was broad The journals were selected in order to analyze bibliographic
in scope and constructed an integrated teaching model framework information. For the purpose of this study, data were collected
that encompassed EE impact and its underlying pedagogy. In addi- from the Social Science Citation Index compiled by the online Web
tion, the study underscored the need for future research on critical of Science (WoS) database, which contain thousands of scholarly
and underdeveloped themes and provided general recommenda- publications and bibliographic information with regard to authors,
tions for research in this field and the practical implications. affiliations, and quotations. Previous research has shown that the
In addition to these two works that provided a global perspec- simultaneous use of other relevant databases does not increase the
tive on EE research, there are other studies that have analyzed the amount of relevant documents captured due to the duplications
state of the field in specific contexts such as entrepreneurship in that occur among the databases (Harzing & Alakangas, 2016). Thus,
engineering education (Da Silva, Costa, & De Barros, 2015), and the this study’s literature survey was conducted using only the WoS
impact of training and EE as facilitators of regional development Core Collection database.
(Galvao, Ferreira, & Marqués, 2018). To undertake the literature survey were carried out different
While each literature review has made important contribu- search steps following Riera and Iborra (2017). First the documents
tions, the present study extends the review of the literature were retrieved using some related terms. In this case, documents
by providing a global EE perspective and going beyond Higher with the generic term “entrepren* education”, appeared as a social
Education. By using bibliometric indicators and mapping the con- science topic (i.e., as keywords in document titles, keywords, and
ceptual structure of EE research, this study provides insights not abstracts). Second the “type of document” was specified as the
previously identified or evaluated in such detail. Relative to tra- “article” and “review” categories. And finally, the documents were
ditional literature review methods, bibliometric analysis provides selected from the discipline categories most commonly used to
objective criteria that can assess the research development in a classify journals that cover EE research including the WoS sub-
field and act as a valuable tool for measuring scholarship qual- categories of “business,” “management,” “economics,” “education
ity and productivity (Cobo, Martinez, Gutiérrez-Salcedo, Fujita, & educational research,” “psychology educational,” or “education sci-
Herrera-Viedma, 2015). Additionally, bibliometric methods offer entific disciplines.” Using these search criteria, the study obtained
systematization and replication processes that can improve under- 325 articles that formed the basis of the bibliometric analysis, and
standing of the dissemination of knowledge in a field and can searched for and counted the articles in the database on January
highlight gaps and opportunities that contribute to the advance- 15, 2018. The oldest article in the dataset is the starting point of the
ment of the discipline. According to Zupic and Čater (2015), analysis. It was an article published in the Journal of Business Ventur-
bibliometrics introduce a systematic, transparent, and reproducible ing, titled “Entrepreneurship education in the nineties” (McMullan
review process, which permits a better description, evaluation, and & Long, 1987). This article traces the history of EE in the nineties by
monitoring of published research. Therefore, bibliometric analyses reviewing propositions from individuals who had begun to use EE
bring a new perspective to EE field as a complement of previous as a part of an economic development strategy.
research.
Bibliometric reviews have been conducted in many research 2.2. Bibliometric analysis
areas, including management (Albort-Morant, Leal-Rodriguez,
Fernandez-Rodriguez, & Ariza-Montes, 2018), economics (Bonilla, Bibliometric analysis is defined as a part of scientometrics,
Merigó, & Torres-Abad, 2015), innovation (Merigó, Cancino, which utilizes mathematical and statistical methods to analyze sci-
Coronado, & Urbano, 2016), entrepreneurship (Baier-Fuentes, entific activities in a research field (Callon, Courtial, & Laville, 1991;
Merigo, Amoros, & Gavieri –Martin, 2018), wine tourism (Duran, López-Fernández et al., 2016). Bibliometrics provides a general pic-
Del Rio, & Alvarez, 2017), and international business (Ferreira, ture of a research field that can be classified by papers, authors,
Pinto, & Serra, 2014). In the area of EE, Galvao, Ferreira, & Marqués, and journals (Merigo & Yang, 2017). Bibliometric methods involve
2018, document the paths for future research agendas, but without two main approaches: a performance analysis and a graphic map-
potential trends for future research. ping of science or bibliometric mapping (Noyons, Moed, & Luwel,
Thus, the aim of this study is to conduct a literature review of 1999). On the one hand, the performance analysis evaluates the
EE research using bibliometric methods. First, using performance impact of citations of the scientific production made by the dif-
analysis, including selected productivity and impact indicators, this ferent actors that interact in a research field. These actors can be
study attempts to highlight and provide an updated overview of EE countries, universities, departments and, of course, researchers.
research by revealing patterns in journals, articles, and authors. The most popular indicators are those that consider the number of
Second, by mapping a co-word analysis, a strategic diagram is publications and the number of citations (Yu & Shi, 2015). The num-
developed to graphically illustrate the themes of current research, ber of publications is correlated to the productivity of the author,
emerging themes, and potential trends for future research. Thus, while the number of citations is correlated to its influence on the
the findings provide a roadmap for further investigation in this scientific community (Merigo & Yang, 2017). On the other hand,
field. science mapping aims to illustrate the structure and dynamics of
The rest of this paper is structured as follows. The next sec- scientific fields (Zupic & Čater, 2015). It is a spatial representation
tion describes the methodology applied in this study’s analysis, of how disciplines, fields, specialties, and documents or authors are
followed by the discussion of the results for the activity indica- related to one another (Moral-Muñoz, Cobo, Peis, Arroyo-Morales,
tors and the science mapping analysis. The final section discusses & Herrera-Viedma, 2014).
the study’s conclusions, limitations, and proposals for future For conducting this study, the Science Mapping Analysis Tool
research. (SciMAT) (Cobo, López-Herrera, Herrera-Viedma, & Herrera, 2012)
 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113 107

articles a year. The expansive stage, which spanned 2008-2017, with

198 articles published. The rate of publication of the articles during
this last stage increased significantly, and thus, this stage accounted
for more than 60% of the total publications over the last 10 years.
Based on this evidence of productivity, for the rest of the study,
the first two periods were combined to form the pre-expansion
stage. Thus, this study distinguished between two principal periods:
pre-expansion, T1, (1987-2007) and expansion, T2, (2008-2017).

3.2. Most influential journals

Table 1 shows the 10 most productive and influential journals in

Fig. 1. Evolution of scientific research on EE the field of EE. Specifically, Table 2 shows the journals with five or
Source: Authors’ own research.
more articles and the journals with more than 100 cites. In addition,
some bibliometric indicators such as the total number of EE papers
was used. The software reports performance indicators and a co- (TP) and total number of citations (TC) are presented. Further, an
word analysis, which is based on the assumption that an article’s indicator has been included for the articles’ citation frequency from
keywords constitute an appropriate description of its contents. The more than 150, 100, 50, 10 citations, to a single citation. Finally,
co-occurrence of two keywords in the same article is an indication Table 1 shows the number of articles in each period, that is, T1 and
of a link between the issues referred to in the article, and reveals T2.
the patterns and trends of a specific discipline by measuring the According to Table 1, the journals with the highest num-
strength of association between the representative terms of rele- ber of published articles on the topic of EE were the Journal
vant publications produced in the same area (Zupic & Čater, 2015). of Small Business Management (22), International Journal of
The thematic networks or clusters generated during the co- Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research (21), Academy of Manage-
word analysis have allowed the synthesis and organization of ment Learning & Education (19), Journal of Business Venturing
existing knowledge in this field and the identification of potential (16), Entrepreneurship and Regional Development (15), and Inter-
avenues for future research. The identification of future research national Entrepreneurship and Management Journal (14).
streams or key research topics is systematically carried out using The two most productive journals have published special issues
SciMAT; that is the main differential characteristic of this biblio- on EE: Journal of Small Business Management (Vol. 51, Issue 3, 2013)
metric software compared to others (i.e. Vosviewer, Biexcel). and International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research (Vol.
24, Issue 3, 2017). This result confirms that EE has increased interest
3. Results among academics in the expansion stage.
It is necessary to note the importance of the Journal Business
The following sections describe some interrelated and comple- Venturing, with twelve of the articles published in the pre-expansion
mentary steps of the performance analysis period (T1), and a total of sixteen articles and 1787 cites. In addition,
Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice had 1193 cites from three pub-
3.1. Evolution of scientific production lished articles, and Academy of Management Learning & Education
had six articles and 575 cites in this period. Table 1 also highlights
Research activity was measured by the number of publica- the Journal of Small Business Management, with twenty articles and
tions during a particular period. Fig. 1 shows the distribution of 771 cites during the expansion period (T2). The International Journal
EE publications from 1987 to 2017 that were used in the study. of Entrepreneurial Behaviour & Research has published twenty one
The changes in productivity over time allowed the identification articles in T2but has only 82 cites.
of three research stages. The initial stage, which spans 1987-2000, Finally, from an overall perspective, the results show that
in which 14 articles were published, at the rate of fewer than research on EE has been progressively published in more journals.
two articles a year (with the exception of 1995, during which five Specifically, in T1, forty seven articles were published in twenty
articles were published). The development stage, which spanned journals, whereas in T2, 278 articles were published in eighty nine
2001-2007, with 33 articles published at the rate of almost five journals.

Table 1
Rankings of the most productive and cited journals in the field.

R JOURNAL TP TC > = 150 > = 100 > = 50 > = 20 > = 10 >=1 TP1 TC1 T2P T2C

1 JSBM 22 874 1 1 7 16 20 22 2 103 20 771

2 IJEBR 21 82 0 0 0 1 3 12 0 0 21 82
3 AMLE 19 854 2 2 4 13 15 19 6 575 13 279
4 JBV 16 1787 2 7 12 14 14 15 12 1598 4 189
5 ERD 15 147 0 0 1 2 4 13 0 0 15 147
6 IEMJ 14 297 0 0 1 6 10 13 0 0 14 297
7 EJMSTE 12 15 0 0 0 0 1 4 0 0 12 15
8 ISBJ 11 341 1 1 1 2 5 10 1 264 10 77
9 ETP 8 1518 4 4 5 6 7 8 3 1193 5 325
10 ML 7 142 0 1 1 2 2 6 2 136 5 6

Abbreviations: R = Rank; TC1 and TP1 indicates Total citations and papers in pre-expansion period, period before 2007, and TC2 in the expansion period after that year; > = 150,
100, 50, 20, 10 and 1 indicates number of papers with equal or more than 150, 100, 50, 20, 10 and 1 citations; JSBM, Journal of Small Business Management; IJEBR, International
Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour & Research; AMLE, Academy of Management Learning & Education; JBV, Journal of Business Venturing; ERD, Entrepreneurship and
Regional Development; IEMJ, International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal; EJMSTE, Eurasia Journal of Mathematics Science and Technology Education; ISBJ,
International Small Business Journal; ETP, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice; ML, Management Learning.
108 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113

Table 2
List of the most cited papers.

R TITLE OF THE PAPER AUTHOR JOUR. YEAr TC TCY T1 T2

1 The emergence of entrepreneurship education: Kuratko (2005) ETP 2005 468 33,43 X
Development, trends, and challenges
2 Do entrepreneurship programmes raise Souitaris et al. (2007) JBV 2007 418 34,83 X
entrepreneurial intention of science and engineering
students? The effect of learning, inspiration and
resources
3 Enterprise education: Influencing students’ Peterman & Kennedy (2003) ETP 2003 381 23,81 X
perceptions of entrepreneurship
4 Gender, entrepreneurial self-efficacy, and Wilson et al. (2007) ETP 2007 344 28,67 X
entrepreneurial career intentions: Implications for
entrepreneurship education
5 The chronology and intellectual trajectory of American Katz (2003) JBV 2003 323 20,19 X
entrepreneurship education 1876-1999
6 Opportunity recognition as pattern recognition: How Baron (2006) AMP 2006 296 22,77 X
entrepreneurs connect the dots to identify new
business opportunities
7 Entrepreneurship education - A systematic review of Pittaway & Cope (2007a) ISBJ 2007 264 22 X
the evidence
8 Entrepreneurship Education: Toward a Model of Honig (2004) AMLE 2004 235 15,67 X
Contingency-Based Business Planning

Source: Authors’ own research.

3.3. Most cited articles Kartz could be considered as a reference author in the EE literature.
Nevertheless, it is necessary to note the number of cites obtained
Table 2 shows the articles with more than 200 citations in the by Kuratko, Al-Laham, Souitaris, Zerbinati, Peterman and Kennedy
WoS (TC) and the number of cites per article by year (TCY). The nine with only one article published on this topic.
most influential articles were published in the pre-expansion period On the other hand, Fayolle and Kartz were among the most pro-
and have a significant number of citations (between 468 and 195). ductive authors, each contributing six articles, followed by Linan
Among them, it is necessary to highlight the articles by Kuratko and Pittaway, who each contributed five articles. In regard to time
(2005) and Peterman & Kennedy (2003) in Entrepreneurship Theory period, Kartz, Pittaway, Cope, Vesper and Gartner are the most pro-
and Practice, and an article by Souitaris et al. (2007) in the Journal ductive in T1, and in T2 Kartz, Fayolle, Pittway, Linan and Van Praag
of Business Venturing, that were the most cited articles and had the are the most productive.
highest annual citation averages in WoS. Therefore, they could be
considered as reference articles in the EE literature. The study by
Kuratko (2005) is the most relevant, not only by the number of cites
but also for its focus. This study analyzed growth and development 3.5. Mapping the conceptual structure of the EE field
in curricula and programs devoted to entrepreneurship and new
venture creation. Having been published near the expansion period, The topic of EE has attracted significant academic interest and
this article advanced the change in the EE research focus, from EE the research focus has evolved over the years. Therefore, this study
as part of an economic development strategy (mcmullan & Long, conducted an analysis of EE’s thematic evolution and created a
1987) to the EE academic perspective (Kuratko, 2005). strategic diagram of EE research using article keywords to deter-
mine the most notable EE research themes. As we have indicated
previously, SciMAT was used to develop the Science Mapping Anal-
3.4. Most influential authors ysis.
SciMAT is based on the bibliometric analysis methodology
Many authors have made fundamental contributions to the defined by Cobo, López-Herrera, Herrera-Viedma, & Herrera (2011)
development of EE. This section presents and ranks some of these to analyze a research field and detect and visualize its concep-
authors, based on the information found in WoS. The measure- tual subdomains (i.e., particular topics/themes or general thematic
ment includes the number of papers published and the number areas) and its thematic evolution.
of citations received, which have been used as measures in previ- Cobo et al. (2011) established stages to analyze a research field
ous studies relevant to the field. Following Merigo and Yang (2017), in a longitudinal framework. First, for each period of T1 and T2,
this study implemented a combined method using both number of the corresponding research themes were detected by applying a
papers published and number of citations received. co-word analysis to the raw data. This was followed by clustering
The field of EE is characterized by continuous growth and the keywords to themes using the simple centers algorithm (Cobo et al.,
participation of a large number of authors. The results indicate that 2011), which locates keyword networks that are strongly linked
698 authors contributed to the publication of 325 documents on EE to each other and that correspond to centers of interest. These
research, which is an average of 2.15 authors per article. The fact themes can be understood as conglomerates of textual information
that only authors have published more than four articles signifies or semantic/conceptual groups of different themes addressed by
low concentration in the field. Table 3 shows the list of authors the research field. The similarity between the keywords is assessed
with more than 200 citations. Note that the authors are ordered using the equivalence index (Callon et al., 1991) and a theme is
according to their productivity in the field (TP). In the case of a labeled using the name of the most significant keyword in the asso-
tie, we considered the total number of citations in the field (TC). ciated thematic network. The graphic representation of a theme is a
Table 3 lists the TC and TP of each author for each period, that is, sphere whose size is proportional to the number of associated doc-
pre-expansion period (T1) and expansion period (T2). uments (Cobo et al., 2011). To obtain a spatial representation of the
Kartz is one of the most productive authors with six articles and thematic clusters of EE, the original keywords assigned by authors
is the second most cited author with 462 cites. Based on the analysis were used. A de-duplicating process was applied to improve data
 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113 109

Table 3
The most productive and cited authors.

R AUTHOR TC TP TC/TP TP1 TC1 TC1/TP1 T2P T2C TC2/TP2

1 Katz, Jerome A. 462 6 77,0 2 404 202,0 4 58 14,5

2 Fayolle, Alain 151 6 25,2 0 0 0,0 6 151 25,2
3 Pittaway, Luke 434 5 86,8 2 376 188,0 3 58 19,3
4 Linan, Francisco 108 5 21,6 1 0 0,0 4 108 27,0
5 Gartner, William 316 4 79,0 3 314 104,7 1 2 2,0
6 Van Praag, Mirjam 246 4 61,5 0 0 0,0 4 246 61,5
7 Cope, Jason 376 2 188,0 2 376 188,0 0 0 0,0
8 Kickul, Jill 350 2 175,0 1 344 344,0 1 6 6,0
9 Honig, Benson 236 2 118,0 1 235 235,0 1 1 1,0
10 Vesper, Karl H 233 2 116,5 2 233 116,5 0 0 0,0
11 Oosterbeek, Hessel 230 2 115,0 0 0 0,0 2 230 115,0
12 Mueller, Stephen L. 204 2 102,0 0 0 0,0 2 204 102,0
13 Neck, Heidi 194 2 97,0 0 0 0,0 2 194 97,0
14 Fiet, James O. 188 2 94,0 1 91 91,0 1 97 97,0
15 Brush, Candida G. 154 2 77,0 1 81 81,0 1 73 73,0
16 Rasmussen, Einar 141 2 70,5 1 122 122,0 1 19 19,0
17 Sorheim, Roger 141 2 70,5 1 122 122,0 1 19 19,0
19 Martin, Bruce C. 135 2 67,5 0 0 0,0 2 135 67,5
20 McNally, Jeffrey J. 135 2 67,5 0 0 0,0 2 135 67,5
21 Kuratko, Donald F 468 1 468,0 1 468 468,0 0 0 0,0
22 Al-Laham, Andreas 418 1 418,0 1 418 418,0 0 0 0,0
23 Souitaris, Vangelis 418 1 418,0 1 418 418,0 0 0 0,0
24 Zerbinati, Stefania 418 1 418,0 1 418 418,0 0 0 0,0
25 Kennedy, Jessica 381 1 381,0 1 381 381,0 0 0 0,0
26 Peterman, Nicole E 381 1 381,0 1 381 381,0 0 0 0,0
27 Marlino, Deborah 344 1 344,0 1 344 344,0 0 0 0,0
28 Wilson, Fiona 344 1 344,0 1 344 344,0 0 0 0,0
29 Baron, Robert A 296 1 296,0 1 296 296,0 0 0 0,0

theme (Moral-Muñoz et al., 2014). Entrepreneurship education had

solid connections to higher education and entrepreneurship learn-
ing. However, entrepreneurship intention only shared keywords
with entrepreneurship education. Provocation was a new theme that
emerged during the second period (T2).
The next step is visualizing the research themes. In this phase,
the themes are visualized by means of two different visualization
instruments: strategic diagram and thematic network (Cobo et al.,
2015). The diagram shows each theme as characterized by two
measures: centrality and density. Centrality measures the degree of
interaction between a network and other networks; in other words,
the strength of external ties to other themes. Density measures the
strength of internal ties among all keywords describing a research
theme and it can be understood as a measure of the theme’s devel-
opment (Murgado-Armenteros, Gutiérrez-Salcedo, Torres-Ruiz, &
Fig. 2. Thematic evolution in the EE research field (1987–2017)
Source: Authors’ own research.
Cobo, 2015)
There are four kinds of themes (Callon et al., 1991; Courtial &
Michelet, 1994; Cahlik, 2000) classified by the quadrant in which
quality by grouping words representing the same concept (consult- they appear in the strategic diagram (Cobo et al., 2011). Themes
ing with peer of the authors of this article). in the upper-right quadrant are known as motor themes, because
After that step, this study analyzed the evolution of the research they exhibit strong centrality and high density. These themes are
themes (Cobo et al., 2012). Their evolution over the whole time well developed and important for the structure of a research field.
period is then measured as the overlapping of clusters from two Themes in the upper-left quadrant are very specialized and pos-
consecutive periods. For this purpose, the inclusion index is used sess a peripheral character. These themes are considered to have
to detect conceptual nexuses between research themes in different marginal importance to the field since they have well-developed
periods and to identify the thematic areas in a research field (Cobo internal ties but unimportant external ties. Themes in the lower-
et al., 2015). Fig. 2 shows the bibliometric map of the thematic evo- left quadrant may represent emerging or disappearing themes,
lution over the two time periods. Each theme is represented in the because they are weakly developed and marginal. These themes
chart by a circle and the lines between circles represent thematic possess low density and low centrality. Accordingly, they have not
networks. demonstrated significant research interest. Themes in the lower-
As Fig. 2 shows, EE was a unique research theme during 1987- right quadrant represent transversal, general, and basic topics.
2007 (T1). However, related topics, including entrepreneurship These themes are important to the research field but are not well
learning, entrepreneurship intention, higher education, and provoca- developed.
tion appeared during 2008-2017 (T2). The solid lines characterize
the connection between periods when the linked themes shared
the same keywords or the label of one theme was a part of 3.5.1. Pre-expansive period (1987-2007) (T1)
another. A dotted line indicates that the themes shared keywords According to the thematic evolution presented in Fig. 2, it was a
that did not indicate the main research topic of the previous unique research theme in this period, so the strategic diagram only
110 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113

Fig. 3. Cluster network of EE themes (1987–2007)

Source: Authors’ own research. Fig. 4. EE research 2007-2018
Source: Authors’ own research.

could have this theme represented. Thus, the research during this in this thematic network were those by Von Graevenitz, Harhoff,
period pivoted on the EE theme. and Weber (2010), Pittaway, Rodriguez-Falcon, Aiyegbayo, and
Based on the analysis of the thematic network of the EE theme, King (2011), Lourenço and Jayawarna (2011), and Middleton and
the keyword network associated with this theme indicates that EE Donnellon (2014).
was the most studied theme according to the number of documents As Fig. 2 indicates, although some related keywords had pre-
(Fig. 3). The topics of this theme involved two principal interre- viously been addressed entrepreneurial intention is a theme that
lated facts. The first fact involved the teaching-learning process (i.e., more fully emerged during this period. It is not sufficiently devel-
entrepreneurial learning and Higher Education) and its methodol- oped for consideration as a motor theme in the field (Fig. 4), but
ogy (i.e., experiential learning) (Pittaway & Cope, 2007a; Pittaway & it is related to other relevant topics (Fig. 5B) in economic devel-
Cope, 2007b). The second fact involved the importance of studying opment strategy (e.g., entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial skills).
the economic effects of the educational process (i.e., entrepreneur- Other important pathways of research such as national culture or
ship) and new business innovators (i.e., start-ups) emerging from personal traits are linked to the theory of planned behavior (TBP).
universities (Parker, 2006; Rasmussen & Sorheim, 2006). The TBP, proposed by Azjen (1985), has been applied to studies on
Nevertheless, at the end of the first period, Pittaway and the relationships among beliefs, attitudes or behavioral intentions,
Cope (2007a) conducted a systematic review of EE evidence and and behaviors (Sanchez, 2010; Zhang, Duysters, & Cloodt, 2014).
detected a need for the reorientation of EE research to include the Moreover, it clearly represents an opportunity for further research,
demand for enterprise skills. They also noted the need to under- based on each of these perspectives (Miranda, Chamorro-Mera, &
stand how different models of entrepreneurship achieve different Rubio, 2017).
objectives. Provocation is a theme that emerges during this period with-
out any relationships with other thematic networks (Fig. 2). Its
3.5.2. Expansive period (2008-2017) (T2) position in the strategic diagram indicates that it does not con-
The four themes identified in the second period of thematic evo- tain any external links to other subjects in the field (Fig. 4).
lution (Fig. 2) are presented in a strategic diagram in Fig. 4, and each However, Fig. 5C indicates that the keyword network related to
theme in the strategic diagram has an associated keyword network this new theme is consistent with the new trends in educational
(Fig. 5A–D). innovation methodologies, which focus on the development of
The strategic diagram presents four themes (Fig. 4). Analysis transversal competencies such as provocation, affect, and imag-
of the position of the themes in the strategic diagram and their ination. This is not confined to the transmission of knowledge.
associated keyword networks reveals that entrepreneurial learn- These new trends have developed new practices of scholarship
ing has been the field’s motor theme. It is related to EE in its in entrepreneurship studies (Hjorth, 2011; Steyaert, Hjorth, &
keyword network (Fig. 5A). Although it remains the most stud- Gartner, 2011).
ied subject based on the number of relevant documents, it lost Finally, higher education and its thematic network demonstrated
its position of network centrality due to new research perspec- the position of the university in the formation of EE knowledge (i.e.,
tives related to the teaching-learning process. That is, students entrepreneurial knowledge) and EE action (i.e., technology transfer)
rather than teachers became the main agents in the educational (Fig. 5D). This is because universities are entities related to these
process. The rest of the topics that use the same network key- interrelated and mutually complementary functions (Bramwell
words (i.e., experience, small firms, guess, and growth) consider the & Wolfe, 2008; Guenther & Wagner, 2008). It is worth high-
same perspective when studying the influence of “learning by lighting that the article by Kartz, Roberts, Strom, and Freilich
doing” in the learning process, including concepts such as expe- (2014) provided a history of the development of cross-campus
rience, social knowledge networks, and the different contexts of entrepreneurship education (CEEE) in the United States and the
entrepreneurship action (Fig. 5A), that are motivations to obtain European Union. It identified different approaches to EE in the con-
the necessary student engagement in EE. Representative papers text of higher education.
 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113 111

Fig. 5. Keyword Networks in EE research (2008-2017)

Source: Authors’ own research.

4. Conclusions, limitations, and proposals for future each, while Linan and Pittaway followed closely behind with five
research articles each. In addition, although not the most productive in terms
of article numbers, Kuratko is the most cited author. Kuratko (2005)
This study examined the evolution of scientific research in conducted a remarkable analysis of the growth and development in
EE between 1987 and 2017, based on publications in the WoS the curricula and programs devoted to entrepreneurship and new
database. Although this study is not the first attempt to conduct a venture creation. The evolution in productivity suggests significant
comprehensive and systematic review of academic EE research, it is growth in the number of published articles since 2008. Thus, the
the first attempt to map an orderly conceptual structure by apply- entire period of study was divided into two consecutive periods:
ing bibliometric techniques. This offers researchers an opportunity pre-expansive, T1 (1987-2007; 21 years; 47 articles) and expansive,
to position their research within this evolving field and allows for T2 (2008-2017; 10 years; 278 articles).
the identification of new avenues of research. It is hoped that the The examination of the field’s conceptual structure through
results presented in this paper will encourage and facilitate new a co-word analysis revealed several thematic networks. EE was
EE research. The results also have important practical implications the unique theme during the first period (T1). However, different
since EE has been a priority across educational policies and across related topics appeared during the second period (T2), includ-
all the academic levels and disciplines. ing entrepreneurship learning, entrepreneurship intention, higher
The bibliometric review demonstrated objective indicators that education, and provocation. In essence, these results are similar
revealed interesting research characteristics. First, the most pro- to the findings of Galvao et al. (2018) whose literature review
ductive journals (i.e., Journal of Small Business Management (22), revealed three interrelated clusters: entrepreneurial universities,
International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research (21) and entrepreneurial spirit, and process of business creation; but this study
Journal of Business Venturing (16) are business-specific journals that doesńt support the dynamic perspective demonstrated with SciMat
do not involve research on the learning and education process. results.
Based on the small number of articles per author (at most six) the Finally, the examination of the evolution of EE research in the
analysis indicates that the research area is not highly concentrated. literature showed that there is a clear interest in determining
The most productive authors, Fayolle and Kartz, had six articles the academic perspective of EE by analyzing both the teaching
112 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113

process and context of EE. Similarly, researchers have been inter- appreciate the institutional support received from the Family Busi-
ested in proposing indicators of success to assess the impact of EE ness Centre of the UPV/EHU in collaboration with the DFB/BFA.
in business creation. Nonetheless, EE research in the second period
(T2) has been more focused on the academic perspective, and
entrepreneurial learning appears as a motor theme in this period References
(T2). These findings indicate a change in the focus of the research
Albort-Morant, G., Leal-Rodriguez, A. L., Fernandez-Rodriguez, V., & Ariza-Montes,
to emphasize the teaching process and EE context. Specifically, A. (2018). Assessing the origins, evolution and prospects of the literature ondy-
emphasis is increasing on new methodologies that situate the stu- namic capabilities: A bibliometric analysis. European Research on Management
dent as the main agent and stress the acquisition of competencies and Business Economics, 24, 42–52.
Baier-Fuentes, F., Merigo, J. M., Amoros, J. E., & Gavieri –Martin, M. (2018). Interna-
rather than just the transmission of knowledge, an essential part
tional entrepreneurship: A Bibliometric overview. International Entrepreneur-
of the education model. Furthermore, the examination of Fig. 5C ship Management Journal, http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11365-017-0487-y
shows that the isolated theme, provocation, is related with aspects Bonilla, C., Merigó, J. M., & Torres-Abad, C. (2015). Economics in Latin America: a
bibliometric analysis. Scientometrics, 105(2), 1239–1252.
of students’ sentiments in the training process (provocation-affect-
Bramwell, A., & Wolfe, D. (2008). Universities and regional economic development:
imagination). This result is consistent with the call for new research The entrepreneurial University of Waterloo. Research Policy, 37(8), 1175–1187.
made by Nabi et al. (2018), who noted that future researchers must Cahlik, T. (2000). Comparison of the maps of science. Scientometrics, 49, 373–387.
provide detailed information on pedagogical methods in order to Callon, M., Courtial, J. P., & Laville, F. (1991). Co-word analysis as a tool for describing
the network of interactions between basic and technological research—the case
understand the impact of EE on their outcomes. of polymer chemistry. Scientometrics, 22, 155–205.
The theme entrepreneurial intention emerged in the second Cobo, M. J., López-Herrera, A. G., Herrera-Viedma, E., & Herrera, F. (2011). An
period but was not developed enough to be considered a motor approach for detecting, quantifying, and visualizing the evolution of a research
field: A practical application to the Fuzzy Sets Theory field. Journal of Informetrics,
theme in the field. In other words, from a bibliometric perspective, 5(1), 146–166.
it appears to be related to other subjects, but it is not dense enough Cobo, M., López-Herrera, A. G., Herrera-Viedma, E., & Herrera, F. (2012). SciMAT: A
to be considered as a motor theme. In their literature review, Nabi new science mapping analysis software tool. Journal of the American Society for
Information Science, 3(8), 1609–1630.
et al. (2017) highlighted that research on EE has focused on short- Cobo, M., Martinez, M. A., Gutiérrez-Salcedo, M., Fujita, H., & Herrera-Viedma,
term, subjective impact measures such as entrepreneurial attitudes E. (2015). 25 years at Knowledge-Based Systems: A bibliometric analysis.
and intentions, rather than longer-term ones such as venture cre- Knowledge-Based Systems, 80, 3–13.
Courtial, J. P., & Michelet, B. (1994). A coword analysis of scientometrics. Scientomet-
ation behavior and business performance, and they called for future
rics, 31(1), 251–260.
research to address this gap. Even so, these authors emphasize the Da Silva, G. B., Costa, H. G., & De Barros, M. D. (2015). Entrepreneurship in engineering
need to examine the moderating effect on the relationship between education: A literature review. International Journal of Engineering Education,
31(6), 1701–1710.
entrepreneurial spirit and its outcomes through other themes such
Diez-Martin, F. (2018). Where we are: An introduction to business education. Journal
as national culture and gender. The present bibliometric study’s of Management and Business Education, 1(1), 1–10.
results are consistent with the demanded future research called Duran, A., Del Rio, M., & Alvarez, J. (2017). Bibliometric analysis of publications on
for by Nabi et al (2017), as demonstrated by the themes related wine tourism in the databases Scopus and WoS. European Research on Manage-
ment and Business Economics, 23, 8–15.
to entrepreneurial intentions, national culture, entrepreneurial skills, Fernández-Portillo, A. (2018). Approach to entrepreneurial education. Journal of
and personal traits, with TBP as the predominant theory used to Management and Business Education, 1(3), 182–189.
justify many of these studies. Ferreira, M. P., Pinto, C. F., & Serra, F. R. (2014). The transaction costs theory in interna-
tional business research: a bibliometric study over three decades. Scientometrics,
It is important to realize that while our study is not specifically 98(3), 1899–1922.
limited to Higher Education, but the results reveal little EE research Galvao, A., Ferreira, J., & Marqués, C. (2018). Entrepreneurship education and training
in this context. In this sense, Nabi et al. (2017), who focused exclu- as facilitators of regional development. A systematic literature review. Journal
of Small Business and Enterprise Development, 25(1), 17–40.
sively on EE research in this specific field, indicated the need for a Guenther, J., & Wagner, K. (2008). Getting out of the ivory tower – new perspectives
current review that focuses on EE pedagogy and outcomes in higher on the entrepreneurial university. European Journal of International Management,
education. 2(4), 400–417.
Harzing, A. W., & Alakangas, S. (2016). Google Scholar, Scopus and the Web of
Finally, some study’s limitations should be pointed out. How-
Science: a longitudinal and cross-disciplinary comparison. Scientometrics, 106,
ever, it must be recognized that all the limitations are due to the 787–804.
compulsory decisions for applying a bibliometric technique like Hjorth, D. (2011). On Provocation, Education and Entrepreneurship. Entrepreneur-
ship and Regional Development, 23(2), 249–263.
SciMAT. First, a methodological bias was introduced during the
Kassean, H., Vanevenhoven, J., Liguori, E., & Winkel, D. (2015). Entrepreneurship
co-word analysis because it was necessary to group some of the Education: a need for reflection, real-world experience and action. International
keywords such as those representing the same concept as the Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, 21(5), 690–708.
authors’ criteria. Second, the maps generated depended on the Kuratko, D. F. (2005). The emergence of Entrepreneurship Education: Development,
trends, and challenges. Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, 29(5), 577–598.
selected parameters. In this sense, different similarity measures Lourenço, F., & Jayawarna, D. (2011). Enterprise education: the effect of creativity on
and different clustering algorithms may have been implemented. training outcomes. International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research,
Expertise in appropriately configuring the SciMat program was 17(3), 224–244.
McMullan, W., & Long, W. A. (1987). Entrepreneurship Education in the nineties.
very important in setting the best parameters to avoid the appear- Journal of Business Venturing, 2(3), 261–275.
ance of strategic diagrams that are too complex to analyze. Merigo, J. M., & Yang, J. B. (2017). A bibliometric analysis of operations research and
The next step in this research might be to conduct a deeper con- management science. Omega, 73, 37–48.
Merigó, J. M., Cancino, C., Coronado, F., & Urbano, D. (2016). Academic research in
tent analysis (using textual analysis software such as NVivo) of the innovation: a country analysis. Scientometrics, 108(2), 559–593.
articles in each thematic cluster to show a more in-depth discus- Middleton, K. W., & Donnellon, A. (2014). Personalizing Entrepreneurial Learning:
sion of each identified theme. In a content analysis there are no A Pedagogy For Facilitating the Know Why. Entrepreneurship Research Journal,
4(2), 167–204.
restrictions on the format of the archives, as is required for the
Miranda, F. J., Chamorro-Mera, A., & Rubio, S. (2017). Academic entrepreneurship in
bibliometric software treatment. Spanish universities: An analysis of the determinants of entrepreneurial inten-
tion. European Resear ch on Management and Business Economics, 23(2), 113–122.
Moral-Muñoz, J. A., Cobo, M. J., Peis, E., Arroyo-Morales, M., & Herrera-Viedma, E.
(2014). Analyzing the research in integrative & complementary medicine by
Acknowledgements means of science mapping. Complementary Therapies in Medicine, 22, 409–418.
Murgado-Armenteros, E. M., Gutiérrez-Salcedo, M., Torres-Ruiz, F. J., & Cobo, M. J.
This work was financially supported by MCIU/AEI/FEDER-UE (2015). Analysing the conceptual evolution of qualitative marketing research
through science mapping analysis. Scientometrics:, 102(1), 519–557.
under the grant number RTI2018-097579-B-100; the UPV/EHU Mwasalwiba, E. S. (2010). Entrepreneurship education: a review of its objectives,
under the grant number GIU16/46; and by FESIDE. We also highly teaching methods, and impact indicators. Education + Training, 52(1), 20–47.
 G. Aparicio et al. / European Research on Management and Business Economics 25 (2019) 105–113 113

Nabi, G., Linan, F., Fayolle, A., Krueger, N., & Walmsley, A. (2017). The Impact Rasmussen, E. A., & Sorheim, R. (2006). Action-based Entrepreneurship Education.
of entreprenership education in higher education: A systematic review and Technovation, 26(2), 185–194.
research agenda. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 16(2), 277–299. Riera, M., & Iborra, M. (2017). Corporate social irresponsibility: review and concep-
Noyons, E. C. M., Moed, H. F., & Luwel, M. (1999). Combining mapping tual boundaries. European Journal of Management and Business Economics, 26(2),
and citation analysis for evaluative bibliometric purposes: A bibliomet- 146–162.
ric study. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50(2), Souitaris, V., Zerbinati, S., & Al-Laham, A. (2007). Do entrepreneurship programmes
115–131. raise entrepreneurial intention of science and engineering students? The effect
Parker, S. C. (2006). Learning About The Unknown: How Fast Do Entrepreneurs of learning, inspiration and resources. Journal of Business Venturing, 22(4),
Adjust Their Beliefs? Journal of Business Venturing, 21(1), 1–26. 566–591.
Peterman, N. E., & Kennedy, J. (2003). Enterprise Education: Influencing Studentś Steyaert, C., Hjorth, D., & Gartner, W. G. (2011). Six Memos for a Curious and imag-
Perceptions of Entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship: Theory and Practice, 28(2), inative future scholarship in entrepreneurship studies. Entrepreneurship and
129–144. Regional Development, 23(1–2), 1–7.
Pittaway, L., & Cope, J. (2007a). Entrepreneurship Education - A systematic review Von Graevenitz, G., Harhoff, D., & Weber, R. (2010). The Effects of Entrepreneurship
of the evidence. Perceptions of Entrepreneurship. International Small Business Education. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 76(1), 90–112.
Journal, 25(5), 479–510. Yu, D., & Shi, S. (2015). Researching the development of Atanassov intuitionistic fuzzy
Pittaway, L., & Cope, J. (2007b). Simulating Entrepreneurial Learning - Integrating set: Using a citation network analysis. Applied Soft Computing, 32, 189–198.
Experiential and Collaborative Approaches to Learning. Management Learning, Zhang, Y., Duysters, G., & Cloodt, M. (2014). The Role of Entrepreneurship Education
38(2), 211–233. as a Predictor of University Students’s Entrepreneurial Intention. International
Pittaway, L., Rodriguez-Falcon, E., Aiyegbayo, O., & King, A. (2011). The Role of Entrepreneurship Management Journal, 10(3), 623–641.
Entrepreneurship Clubs and Societies in Entrepreneurial Learning. International Zupic, I., & Čater, T. (2015). Bibliometric methods in management and organization.
Small Business Journal, 29(1), 37–57. Organizational Research Methods, 18(3), 429–472.