Perceiving the dark side of entrepreneurship: a cross-national study of technical universities students in Latvia, Poland and Ukraine

Purpose This study aims to explore how technical university students in Latvia, Poland and Ukraine perceive the dark sides of entrepreneurship, defined as the negative financial, psychological, ethical and social dimensions often associated with starting and running a business. It addresses the lack of research on how potential future entrepreneurs understand these challenges, an area that has received relatively little attention, especially in Central and Eastern Europe, a region with high entrepreneurial potential but limited empirical insight into how emerging entrepreneurs interpret such risks. Design/methodology/approach Using a cross-national survey design, the study gathered responses from 768 students enrolled in business and economics programs at technical universities, who evaluated 22 items reflecting the dark sides of entrepreneurship on a five-point Likert scale. These items were developed by the authors and informed by previous findings and existing literature on the financial, psychological, ethical and social challenges of entrepreneurship. The underlying structure was first examined through exploratory factor analysis and then tested using confirmatory factor analysis, with measurement invariance testing establishing the cross-national comparability of the instrument. National and gender differences were examined using descriptive statistics, ANOVA, t-tests and latent mean comparisons. Findings Three dimensions of perceived dark sides were identified and internally validated: financial and structural burdens, work–life and emotional imbalance and relational and role management challenges. The three-factor structure was consistent across the three national groups. Polish and Latvian students demonstrated higher overall sensitivity, especially regarding financial risks and regulatory constraints, while Ukrainian students exhibited comparatively lower concern. Gender analyses showed small differences, with female participants rating the dark sides as somewhat more significant than male participants, most clearly in relation to work–life and emotional imbalance. The ethical aspect included in the initial conceptualization was not retained in the final structure. Originality/value This study contributes to growing research on the challenges of entrepreneurship by focusing on a group that has received little attention but holds strong potential to become future founders: technical university students in Central and Eastern Europe. Its main contribution is to show that the anticipated dark side is perceived as a structured set of distinct concerns, and to map how these concerns converge and diverge across three national contexts. The findings offer new insights into how young people understand entrepreneurial risk and help broaden the way we think about entrepreneurship by moving beyond opportunity and innovation to include the real-life difficulties many entrepreneurs face.