Cognitive aspects of disadvantaged entrepreneurs: Evidence from India

ABSTRACT

Both entrepreneurs and community shape and shaped by each other. Understanding entrepreneurship in a community context has received much attention of the scholars. This research contributes to the community entrepreneurship literature by explaining drivers of entrepreneurial activities among disadvantaged community. Cognitive theoretical framework is used to hypothesize the relationship. A large sample of 1173 disadvantaged community people is used. The finding shows that attitude, role model, self-efficacy, social norms, and ability to recognize entrepreneurial opportunities positively encourage disadvantaged people of India to become entrepreneurs. Policy implications have been drawn and discussed to promote entrepreneurial activities amongst Indian disadvantaged community.

KEYWORDS:

• Disadvantaged community
• poor
• India
• entrepreneurs
• lower income
• bottom of pyramid

Acknowledgments

We are thankful to Prof. Mohd Nafees Ahmad Ansari, Director, Centre for Distance and Online Education, Aligarh Muslim University for his support in this research and Sana Arif Ansari for her copy-editing service.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).