Despite the abundant scientific literature on entrepreneurship, there is still only limited
information on young students’ entrepreneurial intentions. The reasons for this, may be generally
found in the different conceptual approaches to entrepreneurial intention, and particularly in the
variables that regulate and act as antecedents to such intentions. This bias has generated different
lines of investigation into the factors relating to entrepreneurial intention among students. One line
of investigation is centered on the variables that influence entrepreneurial intention, in particular,
relational, educational, and psychological variables, and another is centered on the antecedents
of entrepreneurial intention, amongst which is entrepreneurial interest. In this paper, we seek
to analyze the relationship between the entrepreneurial interest of Spanish youth and a set of
socio-educational, psychological, and health-related variables using principal component analysis.
A previously validated ad hoc questionnaire was administered to 1764 students (15–18 years old).
Notably, few Spanish youth expressed significantly high entrepreneurial interest; those who did were
mostly men with a family tradition of entrepreneurial parents, who held high perceptions of their
health and quality of life, and considered it important in business to detect opportunities beforehand
and to create employment. Their principal motives were to improve their professional development,
to put their ideas into practice, and to achieve economic independence. This paper proposes the early
detection of entrepreneurial interests in young people in order to reinforce these interests as potential
long-term initiatives.
