A Cognitive Measure of Entrepreneurial Alertness

Abstract

Alertness is a foundational concept in current understandings of the spotting and exploitation of entrepreneurial opportunities. Yet, despite being identified as a key theoretical construct of individual entrepreneurs, its cognitive features are not fully described in the literature. And as a result, the existing instruments for measuring this cognitive feature of entrepreneurs do not fully reflect the broad nature of this concept. In this study, the cognitive theoretical basis of alertness is reviewed and a new scale, which better reflects the broader cognitive features of entrepreneurial alertness, is presented. This may assist the validity of future empirical studies that involve entrepreneurial alertness.