The mediating role of big five traits and self-efficacy on the relationship between entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial behavior: Study of Tunisian university graduate employees

The present paper aimed to explore the mediating roles of entrepreneurial self-efficacy and the big five personality traits in the relationship between entrepreneurship education and university graduate employees' entrepreneurial behavior. Structural equations modeling was applied to data collected through a survey questionnaire among 300 Tunisian employees with a university degree working in the private sector who participated in 2021 in an entrepreneurship education program provided by the Sfax Business Center, a Public-Private organization. The results demonstrate that entrepreneurship education, entrepreneurial self-efficacy, and the big five personality traits affect entrepreneurial behavior positively. Moreover, entrepreneurship education has a positive effect on self-efficacy and the big five personality traits. The findings also show a significant partial mediation of self-efficacy and the big five personality traits on the relationships between entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial behavior. •Entrepreneurship education positively affects the university graduated employees' entrepreneurial behavior.•Entrepreneurship education contributes to enhancing entrepreneurial self-efficacy, and the big five traits.•A higher level of these competencies strongly predicts entrepreneurial behavior.•Entrepreneurial self-efficacy, and the big five traits partially mediate the link between entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial behavior.