This study aims to investigate the cognitive and normative antecedents of students’ entrepreneurship-driven social business intention (SBI) for multidimensional poverty alleviation in Bangladesh. It contributes to social enterprise scholarship by examining how Yunus-style zero-dividend venture intention is formed at the individual cognition level in a collectivist Global South context.
An extended theory of planned behavior (TPB) framework was used, incorporating knowledge, normative structure and self-efficacy as upstream antecedents. Data were collected from Bangladeshi university students using a five-point Likert scale. Purposive criterion-based sampling and partial least squares structural equation modeling were used for this cross-sectional study.
(1) Attitude significantly affects SBI, (2) knowledge significantly affects attitude, (3) normative structure significantly affects subjective norms, (4) subjective norms significantly affect SBI, (5) self-efficacy significantly affects perceived behavioral control and (6) PBC significantly affects SBI. All three mediating pathways bridging knowledge through attitude, normative structures through subjective norms and self-efficacy through PBC are positively significant.
The cross-sectional design and single-country sample limit generalizability. Future research should use longitudinal designs and cross-cultural comparisons across diverse Global South contexts to further validate these psychological mechanisms.
Strengthening community-level normative support, social business knowledge and self-efficacy among students can accelerate social business formation, effectively mobilizing young entrepreneurs to contribute toward achieving sustainable development goal 1.
This study establishes that Yunus style SBI formation in collectivist Global South settings is primarily governed by community-level normative structures and self-efficacy rather than individual attitude, challenging the conventional TPB predictive hierarchy.
