5. Your Theory of Value: Testable Hypotheses Before You Build
After this lesson you can
- Explain what the 2020 and 2024 scientific-approach trials found, keeping the two studies separate
- Distinguish a gap in the literature from a need in the market
- Write a light theory of value in five parts
- Turn a theory into three falsifiable hypotheses with thresholds and decision rules set before testing
- Match each hypothesis to a rung on the five-rung evidence ladder
Video coming soon
Videos are planned to publish from December 2026.
A lesson on making an idea testable before building it. It presents the scientific approach to entrepreneurial decisions and its trial evidence, separates a research gap from a market need, and shows how to write a light theory of value with hypotheses and thresholds.
Questions and answers
Questions a learner would ask about this lesson. Think through your own answer before you open each one.
- My literature review found a gap. Doesn't that prove there is a market?
Show answer
No. A gap in the literature is a question published research has not yet answered. A need in the market is a problem specific people already experience, already spend time or money on, and would change their behavior to solve. A gap shows missing knowledge; whether anyone has the problem and will pay still has to be tested with people.
- What did the scientific-approach trials actually find?
Show answer
The 2020 trial randomly assigned 116 startups in Milan; treated founders performed better and were more likely to pivot, but were not more likely to drop out early. The 2024 replication combined four trials with 759 firms and found treated firms more likely to terminate ideas, about 9.8 percentage points higher in the combined sample. The lesson stresses keeping the two studies separate.
- What goes into a light theory of value?
Show answer
Five parts: who has the problem, what they do about it now, why they would change, what value is created and captured, and what must be true. Social ventures write beneficiary claims and funder claims separately, and research commercialization separates technical claims from customer claims.
- Why must the threshold be set before testing?
Show answer
An evidence threshold is the result, set before testing, that counts as enough support to act. A decision rule written beside it says what happens if the threshold is met (proceed), clearly missed in one group (pivot one part and retest) or missed with no promising change (stop or set aside). Setting them first keeps confirmation bias from quietly moving the goalposts.
- What is the evidence ladder?
Show answer
A course framework that orders evidence from what people say toward what they commit to. Its five rungs are conversations about past behavior, observation, stated-preference surveys, behavioral tests and commitments. Each rung fits a different kind of hypothesis.
Practice quiz
- Question 1In the 2024 replication by Camuffo and colleagues, founders trained in the scientific approach were more likely to:
- Question 2How many firms were in the 2020 randomized trial?
- Question 3Founder D says their sensor fills a gap no paper has addressed, so utilities will buy it. The claim confuses:
- Question 4Founder A writes "at least six of fifteen clinic managers will describe scheduling delays as a top-three problem" before interviewing. This is:
- Question 5Founder A's threshold is six of fifteen managers. What percentage is that?
- Question 6Novelli and Spina found that for founders with less-developed business models, heavy theory testing was associated with:
- Question 7Which statement is falsifiable in the lesson's sense?
- Question 8On the evidence ladder, which rung tests willingness to commit?
- Question 9Under the creation view of opportunity, opportunities:
- Question 10Founder C writes beneficiary hypotheses and funder hypotheses separately. Why?
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