An Investigation of Educational and Psychological Factors Affecting the Entrepreneurship Development in Women Rural Cooperatives in Golestan Province

The purpose of this research was to investigate educational and psychological factors affecting the entrepreneurship development in women rural cooperatives in Golestan province. This was a descriptive-correlative research. The statistical population of consisted of 1558 persons (all women that were members of rural cooperatives in Golestan province). Sample size was determined using Cochran formula and 276 persons completed the questionnaires. The research instrument was a questionnaire and its content validity was gained by a group of extension specialists. In order to investigate reliability of research questionnaire, 30 persons were randomly selected and completed the questionnaires. Also, Cronbach's alpha, ordinal theta and combination reliability were 0.89, 0.90 and 0.87 respectively. The data analysis for descriptive and inferential statistics used the SPSSWin21 and LISREL (8/5) software. The results indicated that Entrepreneurship Development was influenced by both the educational and psychological factors. Psychological factors had the greatest impact on the development of women's entrepreneurship in rural cooperatives in Golestan (Path coefficient =0.37). Also based on Completely Standardized Solution (CSS), of between apparent and latent variables, the highest effect on Entrepreneurship Development in women rural cooperatives in Golestan province was related to Changes in marketing methods for products supplied by the Cooperatives.