Accepted Author Manuscript: Electronic version of an article published as Journal of Enterprising Culture 2018 26:02, 113-153 [https://doi.org/10.1142/S021849581850005X] © [copyright World Scientific Publishing Company] [https://www.worldscien- tific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S021849581850005X] “I Want to Be Like You!”: The Influence of Role Models on Entrepreneurial Intention Katharina Fellnhofer (LUT School of Business and Management, Lappeenranta University of Technology, P. O. Box 20, 53851 Lappeenranta, Finland) and Susan Mueller (Swiss Research Institute of Small Business and Entrepreneurship University of St. Gallen, Dufourstrasse 40a, 9000 St. Gallen, Switzerland) Page 1 of 52 “I want to be like you!” The influence of role models on entrepreneurial intention KATHARINA FELLNHOFER, Lappeenranta University of Technology, Finland SUSAN MUELLER, University St. Gallen Dr. Katharina Fellnhofer Lappeenranta University of Technology LUT School of Business and Management P.O. Box 20 53851 Lappeenranta FINLAND Phone +43 664 4212920 Email: katharina.fellnhofer@lut.fi Prof. Dr. Susan Mueller Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship University of St. Gallen, Swiss Research Institute of Small Business and Entrepreneurship Dufourstrasse 40a 9000 St. Gallen SWITZERLAND Phone +41 71 224 71 24 Email: susan.mueller@unisg.ch Acknowledgment The author would like to thank the Austrian Science Fund FWF [J3740] and the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) for supporting this research project. The author would like to express appreciation to Prof. Kaisu Puumalainen for supervising the overall research project. Furthermore, the author would like to thank the following researchers for their assistance with the collection of the data: Prof. Helena Sjögrén, Prof. Nicos Komninos, Prof. Panagiotis Tsarchopoulos and Mag. Franz Stummer. Special thanks are extended to the entrepre- neurs sharing their entrepreneurial lives with us.