Personality Traits and Social Entrepreneurial Intention: The Mediating Effect of Perceived Desirability and Perceived Feasibility

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the effect of personality traits on social entrepreneurial intention by extending Mair and Noboa’s (2006) model. Data were collected from a sample survey of 503 individuals. The four-step method suggested by Baron and Kenny (1986) was followed to test the mediational roles of perceived desirability and perceived feasibility in the relationship between six personality traits (need for achievement, risk-taking propensity, innovativeness, proactiveness, empathy and moral obligations) and social entrepreneurial intention. The results showed that the two mediators fully mediated the effects of proactiveness on social entrepreneurial intention, whereas both the mediators were found partially mediating the impact of moral obligation on social entrepreneurial intention. In addition, only perceived feasibility fully mediated the effects of innovativeness on social entrepreneurial intention and partially mediated the effects of empathy. These research results are expected to trigger a change in social entrepreneurship education by cultivating personality traits towards sustainable development. This study’s originality lies in its exploration of potential social entrepreneurs’ personality traits as a combination of general entrepreneurial and social entrepreneurial traits.

Impact of Universities’ Partnerships on Students’ Sustainable Entrepreneurship Intentions: A Comparative Study

“…Krueger and Brazeal proposed the EPM model by integrating the Entrepreneurial Event Model (EEM) and the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) in which few concepts were overlapping. Findings indicate that the credibility depends on the perception of desirability and on understanding of feasibility of the venture opportunity that leads towards the behaviour which also depends on the person's potential who wants to start the venture [19]. The researchers such as [33] mentioned that EPM interacts with the two significant models, i.e., EEM and TPB.…”

“…In other words, sustainable entrepreneurship intentions refer towards the intentions of individuals to engage themselves in the process of recognizing, assessing, and availing the entrepreneurial opportunities that could minimize a firm's influence on the natural environment and create the benefits for the whole society as well as for local communities by improving their living standards. Entrepreneurial attitude, perceived desirability, and perceived feasibility have been considered the critical factors that have been studied widely to explore the entrepreneurship intention among students under various contexts [1,18,19]. The attitude towards a certain behaviour indicates the favourable or unfavourable assessments of the individual regarding that behaviour [18].…”

“…If one believes that individuals from their surrounding society accept the activity, this will improve one's attitude towards the behavior. Such social burdens are an obstacle to embarking on any business venture [19]. On the other hand, the perceived feasibility is the extent to which the individual feels capability to start business [1,18].…”

“…Perceived feasibility indicates the extent to which one feels personally more competent to start the new venture and refers to the extent to which one believes himself to be capable of carrying out a behaviour. Thus, the presence of mentors, guidance, and role models assist in developing one's perception towards feasibility and gives more confidence to believe that there is some potential and implementation of business idea is very much possible [19].…”

The Impact of Psychological Factors on Women Entrepreneurial Inclination: Mediating Role of Self-Leadership

“…Dispositional variables can be depicted as identity attributes, needs, demeanor, inclination, and thought processes that result in a propensity to respond to circumstances in a foreordained (inclined) way. Entrepreneurial intention is impacted by suitability, the requirement for accomplishment, regard toward oneself, locus of control, emotional demeanor, and association ( Wu et al, 2019 ; Tan et al, 2021 ). Modern analysts have questioned the usefulness of personality measures in anticipating occupation-related criteria, in light of doubtful study results ( Guion and Gottier, 1965 ; Ahmed et al, 2020 ) and are concerned that most personality measures are replicated.…”