Keywords

Social Entrepreneurship, Systematic Literature Review, ADO Framework; Entrepreneurial Intention, Education.

Introduction

Social entrepreneurship has gained prominence by evolving as a research domain in recent years in the academic community (Choi et al., 2014; Dorado et al., 2013; Kraus et al. 2017). (Nicholls & Alex, 2010) notes that there was no consensus on the definition of social entrepreneurship among the research community, as it is a socially contested concept, but most researchers agree that the core character of social entrepreneurship is to have a dual mission of creating social and economic value (Doherty et al., 2014; Pache et al., 2013). Nevertheless, the ambiguity of the term has made it difficult to detach it from other phenomena such as philanthropy and charity (Acset al., 2013), social innovation (Phillips et al., 2015), sustainability and corporate social responsibility (Nicolopoulou & Katerina, 2014) and commercial entrepreneurship. Even though social entrepreneurs are similar to commercial entrepreneurs in respect of opportunity identification, exploitations, resource mobilization, and innovation to form a new venture or manage an existing venture in an innovative form, the difference lies in creating the social value to achieve their social mission (Zahra et al., 2009). However, the opportunity identification stems from societal issues, such as poverty and inadequate healthcare, clean water, and education (Zahra et al., 2016). Social entrepreneurs create innovative solutions to solve the social problems that were long neglected (Short et al., 2009) while securing profits (Bacq et al., 2016), which leads to a dual mission of maintaining the balance between social and economic elements.

Social entrepreneurship starts with an intention influenced by opportunity recognition. These intentions, in turn, are developed from the perceived feasibility and desirability of entrepreneurial action (Krueger, 2000). The antecedents of Entrepreneurial Intentions and Social Entrepreneurial Intentions are similar as they share many characteristics (Santos et al., 2021). The seminal work by resulted in a framework based on the theory of planned behavior to explain the antecedents leading to the formation of social entrepreneurial intention. Social entrepreneurial intentions are the stepping stones to form a future social enterprise; therefore, it is of utmost importance to understand the development of these intentions and examine all the factors that could lead to it. Even though social entrepreneurial intention (SEI) has received scholarly interest in recent years, it might face a risk of stagnation and rigor as most of its concepts are derived from entrepreneurial studies (particularly entrepreneurial intention).

Tan et al., 2020 carried out a systematic literature review with a focus on the emerging themes in SEI when the area was nascent (N=36). Despite social entrepreneurial intention growing as a subfield of entrepreneurial intention research, we still lack a systematic and critical review of the literature on SEI to encapsulate the insights and provide a theoretical framework to articulate a future research agenda. Nonetheless, we still consider substantial room for advancing the area, as evident from the papers published after 2020, particularly during COVID-19 (Nakpodia et al., 2023). We attempted to provide an overview of the literature on social entrepreneurial intention with this study by reviewing all the relevant papers with SEI as the core theme. We developed a comprehensive framework of antecedents, decisions, outcomes, mediators, moderators, and theories for analyzing SEI. Our main intention is to complement the prior reviews in this area and contribute to the existing body of knowledge by conducting an in-depth systematic literature review to manifest the evolution of various aspects of social entrepreneurial intentions over time. The phenomenon for this study could potentially identify future research directions for scholars in this area. We intend to address the following research questions as a part of our study: How has the social entrepreneurial intention as a research area evolved? What are the antecedents leading to the formation of SEI? What are the emerging future research areas in SEI?

Our review makes two primary contributions to the social entrepreneurship literature. First, we contribute to the developing body of literature to understand social entrepreneurial intention's situational and dispositional antecedents. Despite repeated calls for developing a framework, SEI literature is still fragmented, focusing mainly on the antecedents of SEI creation. Our review highlights how the framework can be utilized to understand the research gaps in SEI literature and advance the literature. Second, our review incorporates an in-depth analysis of previous study characteristics so that trends within specific methodological, thematic, and theoretical areas can be visualized to accentuate and scrutinize best practices. Finally, the study resulted in a theoretical ADO framework of SEI with antecedents, decisions, and outcomes. The ADO framework comprises SEI's Antecedents, Decisions, Outcomes, mediators, moderators, and popular theories. Antecedents emerged into two broad categories: Situational factors and Disposition factors, further classified into subcategories. Based on the research gaps identified from reviewing the literature, the current study contributes a comprehensive agenda for future research to aid the theoretical advancement of the field.

Methodology

A systematic literature review captures those papers that address a specific phenomenon by systematically, transparently, and reproducibly synthesizing existing literature to enhance the knowledge base. To ensure the highest quality in the study, we considered only peer-reviewed articles listed in reputable indexes, excluding all others, such as conference papers and book chapters, which are the standard practices in literature reviews to ensure external validity (Boiral et al., 2018). We followed the methodological principles laid down by (Kraus et al., 2020) to identify, appraise, and synthesize relevant studies that could be reproducible and adopted a framework-based review suggested by (Paul et al., 2018).

As outlined in Figure 1, we carried out the five-step search process.

In the first step, we used the Web of Science as a database as it contains the highest quality and ensures high transparency levels, and then applied a Boolean keyword search in Sep 2023 with specific terms of the topic in the abstract, title, or keywords that included: 'social' AND 'entrep*’AND 'intent*.' We also searched for articles in Google Scholar and Scopus with the exact keywords. This search, without any journal restrictions, produced 642 published articles.

Second, we conducted a journal-specific search using the same string. Given the 'tension between the statistical benefits of including a large number of primary studies and conducting a high-quality review of fewer studies (Tranfield et al., 2003), we focussed on all the major entrepreneurship journals publishing on Social Entrepreneurship by running the same string in the search bar. This search resulted in 9 additional articles, increasing the sample size to 651.

Third, we removed all the duplicates from the revised sample list of 651 articles,and then two experienced researchers analyzed each paper’s relevance to SEI. For this article, we restricted ourselves to including articles that explicitly and specifically state SEI as their core research topic. Whenever there was a disagreement between the two researchers, one of the paper's authors made a judgment to be more inclusive rather than too restrictive. This step resulted in around 445 publications.

Fourth, we read all 445 publications to understand their relevance to this review of SEI. We next excluded case proceedings, case studies, and work that is outside of English in line with (Andreini et al., 2020). We also made sure that the remaining publications focussed on Social entrepreneurial intention. This search resulted in 78 publications.

Fifth, we reviewed the other work of the authors of the remaining publications to check if there were any matches. In addition, we surveyed prior literature reviews published on the SE to identify any relevant articles. This search resulted in two more articles that met our criteria and were included, thereby taking the final sample to 80.

Descriptive Results

After clearly considering the distribution of articles over the journals, we found that 45 journals published these 80 articles. However, our analysis revealed that only 11 journals published more than or equal to 2 articles, representing 58% (46) of the articles in the sample Table 1.

Table 1 Prominent Journals with More than one Publication
Journal Name	No. of Articles
Journal of Social Entrepreneurship	8
The Journal of Entrepreneurship	8
Journal Of Business Research	6
Entrepreneurship Research Journal	4
International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research	4
Journal Of Business Ethics	4
International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal	4
Voluntas	4
Journal Of Small Business Management	2
Management Decision	2
Studies In Higher Education	2

Table 2 illustrates the top articles on the SEI topic with more than 100 citations, indicating that it is an emerging topic.

Table 2 Top Articles with more than 100 Citations
Article Name	Citation Count
Sociocultural factors and social entrepreneurial intention during the COVID-19 pandemic: Preliminary evidence from developing countries	157
What Inspires Social Entrepreneurship? The Role of Prosocial Motivation, Intrinsic Motivation, and Gender in Forming Social Entrepreneurial Intention	136
Starting up, Not Slowing Down: Social Entrepreneurial Intentions in later working-life	135
The Impact of social capital on Entrepreneurial Intention and its antecedents: Differences between social capital online and offline	130
Self-Efficacy and Subjective Norms as Moderators in the Networking Competence-Social Entrepreneurial Intentions Link	129
The Influence of Personality Traits and Demographic Factors on Social Entrepreneurship Start-Up Intentions	128
What motivates social entrepreneurs? A meta-analysis on predictors of the intention to found a social enterprise	126
Opportunity Recognition Behavior and Readiness of Youth for Social Entrepreneurship	116
Do Volunteers Intend to Become Social Entrepreneurs? The Influence of Pro-Social Behavior on Social Entrepreneurial Intentions	114
Passionate to be a social entrepreneur in Saudi Arabia: A moderated mediation analysis of Social Entrepreneurial Intention	107
Would customers of social enterprises become social entrepreneurs?	107
Social Entrepreneurship and Volunteering: Moderation Effects of Volunteer Experience Levels on Social Entrepreneurial Intent Model	105
From Opportunity Recognition to the Start-up Phase: The Moderating Role of family and friends-based entrepreneurial social networks	103
Factors Affecting Social Entrepreneurial Intention: An Application of Social Cognitive Career Theory	101
Can there only be one? - an empirical comparison of four models on social entrepreneurial intention formation	100

Table 3 and Figure 2 present the paper distribution over the years, depicting that the topic has interested many researchers in recent years.

Table 3 Distribution of Studies Across Years
Year	No. Of Articles
2006	1
2009	1
2010	1
2013	1
2014	3
2015	2
2017	6
2018	3
2019	10
2020	8
2021	21
2022	8
2023	15
Total	80

Figure 3 details a theoretical framework of the SEI. The framework consisting of Antecedents, Decisions, and Outcomes, moderators, mediators, and popular theories used to explain SEI are developed after reviewing the literature. The ADO framework is used to systematize research findings of a construct and its relationships in a very structured way. Antecedents are the key drivers of involvement in a behavior; the decision gives out the behavioral performance types, and outcomes list the consequences of performing a specific behavior. We classified papers that fall into these categories, and the resulting framework (Figure 3) allowed for a relatively detailed analysis of the literature by capturing historical and more recent trends in SEI research. This framework should not be viewed as a research model perse but rather as a scheme for categorizing ideas so that it helps describe past and future research.

Findings and Discussion

Our literature review identified social entrepreneurial intentions' antecedents, decisions, and outcomes. Antecedents are further classified into two broad categories: Dispositional and Situational factors. Personality, Demographic, Cognitive, and Life events are grouped under Dispositional factors, whereas Social norms, Environment, Social networks, and Education are grouped under Situational factors. A theoretical ADO framework (Figure 3) was developed comprising the antecedents, decisions, outcomes, mediators, moderators, and the theories used to explain the SEI.

Antecedents

Disposition Factors

Subjective Norms

The variables in subjective norms include moral obligation (society’s expectations of an individual), empathy (society’s requirements from an individual), and perceived social support (individual’s expectations from society). (Ajzen 1991) argued that subjective norms are the perceived social pressure on an individual to perform or not in a manner acceptable or unacceptable to society and, in a way, are the predictors of entrepreneurial intentions. (Ernst, 2011) demonstrated an insignificant direct relationship between subjective norms and social entrepreneurship, which means that social pressure does not translate to becoming a social entrepreneur, but (Tiwari et al., 2017) found a significant effect between subjective norms and social entrepreneurial intention.

In the subjective norms, Empathy, in particular, positively influenced social entrepreneurial intentions in corporate volunteers, journalists, and students (Ip et al. 2018; Rambe et al., ; Simmou et al., 2023). Not so surprisingly, empathy also influenced Islamic social entrepreneurship positively, as empathy was one of the pillars of Islam. (Tan et al., 2021) also showed the indirect effect of empathy on social entrepreneurial intentions. Interestingly, cognitive empathy had a positive influence, whereas affective empathy negatively influenced the formation of social entrepreneurial intentions. Affective empathy influenced SEI negatively through self-efficacy, and cognitive empathy positively through social worth (Bacq et al., 2018). It is, in turn, demonstrated that higher levels of social empathy could lead to social opportunity recognition and, ultimately, to social entrepreneurial intentions. On the other hand, few studies have examined factors that could develop empathy, potentially leading to social entrepreneurial intentions. Of these, (Sousa-Filho et al., 2023) argued that experience-based entrepreneurial educational programs could aid in forming the empathy needed for social entrepreneurial intention development. Empathy was also found to moderate the relationship between network competence and social entrepreneurial intentions. Surprisingly, empathy did not significantly influence volunteers' SEI, even though social entrepreneurs and volunteers share some important motivations and behaviors (Trajano et al., 2023). However, later studies observed that being empathetic may not always mean individuals will become social entrepreneurs, and there could be instances where empathy would not translate into social entrepreneurial intentions (Younis et al., 2021). On the other hand, Compassion, a critical dimension of empathy, was also found to influence social entrepreneurial intentions significantly (Rieger et al., 2021; Stirzaker et al., 2021).

The other variable in subjective norms, moral judgment, and one of the antecedents of social entrepreneurial intention, is defined as a cognitive process motivating an individual to strive for the benefit of others, thereby achieving a common good, was found to have a statistically significant influence on social entrepreneurial intention (Zaremohzzabieh et al., 2019). However, other studies did not reveal any positive relationship between moral obligation and social entrepreneurial intention, leaving room for further research. Even the interaction effect of moral obligation and networking competence is insignificant, which supports the argument that moral obligation as a subjective norm is environment-based (Ajzen 1991). Interestingly, moral obligation influenced Islamic social entrepreneurial intentions significantly, as it is one of the core values of Islam and Islamic economics.

Perceived social support (PSS) refers to how individuals perceive their friends, colleagues, and family to be available in times of need and provide them with functional and other support. It was found to positively influence social entrepreneurial intentions for journalists (Liu et al. 2019), students (Hockerts 2017), volunteers and other participants (Ip et al. 2018) looking to establish a social venture. Perceived social support was also found to influence the self-efficacy required for forming social entrepreneurial intentions. Surprisingly, PSS was found to negatively moderate the relationship between network competence and social entrepreneurial intentions, implying that with a higher level of PSS, an individual’s intentions to engage in social entrepreneurship are reduced (Igwe et al., 2020).

Personality

Big Five personality traits are found to influence entrepreneurial intentions. Prior studies on commercial entrepreneurship revealed that Conscientiousness, Openness, and Extraversion positively influenced EI (Brandstätter & Hermann, 2011), whereas Neuroticism negatively influenced EI, thereby implying that individuals scoring high in Conscientiousness and Openness exhibit strong entrepreneurial intentions. Researchers have also examined the effect of personality traits on the formation of social entrepreneurial intentions, and it was found that personality traits significantly influence SEI formation. Data collected from students in Bangladesh illustrated that Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Extraversion influenced SEI significantly, whereas Emotional stability and Openness were found to be significant predictors of SEI.

A similar study on students' social entrepreneurial intentions in Taiwan and Hongkong revealed that Conscientiousness and Openness negatively influenced SEI, manifesting the difference between profit-driven businesses and social enterprises. Interestingly, another study conducted in Taiwan (Liu et al., 2021) contradicted by demonstrating that Openness, Extraversion, and Agreeableness could positively predict SEI, while Conscientiousness negatively predicted SEI. The inconclusive results of the effect of personality traits on SEI indicate further research in this area. In the subsequent studies, it was observed that the Big Five traits could directly or indirectly influence SEI through Empathy, Social support, and other antecedents of SEI. Researchers have also focussed on the dark triads of personality and found that narcissism significantly influences social entrepreneurial intentions (Wu et al., 2021).

Researchers have shown that having a proactive personality can also predict social entrepreneurial intentions (Aloulou et al., 2023), arguing that people passionate about social problems would intend to start a social venture. Even though social and commercial entrepreneurs have similar personality traits, what distinguishes the former from the latter is the 'social traits,' such as empathy, moral judgment, and desire to help others (Tiwari, Bhat, and Tikoria 2022). In addition to the Big Five personality traits, two social personality traits, empathy and moral obligation, were found to influence SEI significantly (L. P. Tan, Pham, and Bui 2021). Entrepreneurial autonomy was also found to influence social entrepreneurial intentions through self-efficacy (To et al. 2020).

Researchers examined the role of leadership in predicting social entrepreneurial intentions and found it to have a strong and significant influence (Henley et al. 2017). Among the leadership styles, Servant leadership was a key predictor of social entrepreneurial intentions (Rivera et al., 2018).

Demographics

Early studies found that age was not a limitation for forming entrepreneurial intentions, and it was supported that SEI could increase with age (Maalaoui et al. 2023). The effect of age on social entrepreneurial intentions was examined by (Djebali et al.,2023), and interestingly, it was found that SEI at a later stage could be influenced by necessity, fulfillment, and experienced later life, with age being perceived as a positive construct rather than a barrier.

Gender stereotype perceptions, defined as a set of particular beliefs about the characteristics to be possessed by men and women, are also found to influence individuals' entrepreneurial intentions (Hossain et al., 2021). (Hamdani et al. 2023) demonstrated that gender stereotype perception positively and significantly influences entrepreneurial intentions in women. Interestingly, prosocial and intrinsic motivations were found to primarily affect women's desire to become social entrepreneurs more than men. This finding contrasts the commercial entrepreneurship literature, which states that women are less encouraged than men to own a business (Yamini et al., 2022). On the other hand, women tend to develop more confidence in their capabilities based on prior experience than men, influencing social entrepreneurial self-efficacy and forming social entrepreneurial intentions.

Perceived and Cognitive Factors

Mair and Noboa 2006 were the first to propose perceived feasibility (PF) and perceived desirability (PD) as antecedents of social entrepreneurial intention, in which perceived feasibility refers to the capability and perceived desirability refers to the desire of an individual to form a venture. (Urban et al., 2017) Demonstrated that perceived desirability and feasibility could positively influence social entrepreneurial intentions. (Ghazali et al., 2021) Noted that in individuals with rich prior experience, only perceived desirability could substantially influence social entrepreneurial intention. Interestingly, another study (Dickel et al., 2021) demonstrated that the effect of PD and PF on SEI could be enhanced through a high level of sustainable orientation.

Social Entrepreneurial Self-efficacy (SESE) is the belief in oneself to address social problems through social ventures. Unlike personality traits, it can be nurtured and developed in an individual, as it is more of a cognitive process (Wang et al., 2016). SESE is a vital element in social entrepreneurial intention formation(Forster et al., 2013; Ip et al. 2018), and therefore, individuals with higher SESE are more likely to explore entrepreneurial opportunities, leading to opportunity recognition (Shane et al., 2003). Opportunity recognition refers to an individual’s ability to recognize, discover, or construct patterns and concepts (Ozgen et al., 2007). Some researchers consider it an antecedent (Puni et al., 2018), and others as the outcome of entrepreneurial intention (Jarvis 2016). Opportunity recognition was also found to lead the youth towards social entrepreneurship by developing social entrepreneurial intentions.

The other factor influencing social entrepreneurial intentions is entrepreneurial creativity, which can be evaluated in two dimensions: Originality (something unique) and Usefulness (Runco et al., 2012). Social entrepreneurial creativity was observed to influence social entrepreneurial intentions indirectly (Bellò et al., 2017) and directly (Peng et al., 2019).

Money ethics and public service motivation, which are the two sides of the same coin, can influence SEI directly and indirectly (Chandra et al., 2021). (Parris et al., 2014) argue that not all social ventures are started to create social value, and there could be profit-making intention as an antecedent to social entrepreneurial intention. In addition to these, Self-oriented motives such as entrepreneurial lifestyle, repurposing expertise, and solving a social or environmental puzzle (Mascena et al., 2023) and intrinsic motivation are also found to influence SEI significantly.

Life Events

Prior life events, such as experience with social enterprises, poverty, and family trauma, are found to have an influence on social entrepreneurial intention. Like education, experience is also considered to attain the knowledge, skills, and abilities required for starting a venture (Marvel et al., 2016). In their seminal paper on SEI mentioned that prior experience with social enterprises could be an antecedent of SEI, which was further supported by various studies (Ip et al. 2018) which also holds true in developing economies. He attempted to explain the factors that moderate the relationship between prior experience and SEI. The study's results confirmed that self-efficacy is a mediating variable in the prior experience and SEI relationship. Hockerts further emphasized that prior experience with social organizations involves exposure to social issues or social entrepreneurs, and such experiences could advance self-beliefs, leading to social entrepreneurship and building support networks. Prior experience helps develop practical knowledge and skills that only education cannot provide, and this could be useful in creating a social venture, which increases confidence in one’s ability to start a social venture.

Further studies, such as (Pham et al., 2022) emphasized that the experience gained through real-world observation of social issues and the positive results from successful social entrepreneurs can also trigger interest in social entrepreneurship. Subsequent studies also examined the correlation between the level of experience and SEI. They demonstrated that highly experienced individuals have high exposure to the social environment and, therefore, get a better understanding of the government regulations, perceived social support to undertake social ventures, and better manage risks by safeguarding the ventures from potential risks. The importance of prior experience is also tested with nonprofit organization workers by (Chang et al., 2021), who suggested that workers having rich experience with social problems were highly likely to maintain action-oriented social innovation. (Ko et al., 2022) argued that having social experience could impact social entrepreneurial self-efficacy strongly compared to commercial entrepreneurial self-efficacy, implying a solid influence on SEI. (Ashraf & Mohammad, 2021) demonstrated that prior experience in Islamic social ventures also significantly impacts Islamic social entrepreneurial intentions. Surprisingly, the prior commercial experience of the CEO of a Nonprofit organization (NPO) has also been found to positively affect SEI (Tan et al., 2015). This effect could be due to the social cause of the NPO, which might positively influence social entrepreneurial intentions.

An individual’s decision to engage in entrepreneurship is often influenced by the behavior and opinion of others who are considered role models who, at the individual level, could be parents or family members (Chlosta et al., 2012) or networks and peer groups (Falck et al., 2012). The positive effect of role models on the formation of social entrepreneurial intention was supported by various studies (Keles et al., 2021; Laviolette et al., 2012).

Situational Factors

Social Norms

Social norms refer to the perceived level of social pressure about assuming a particular behavior. Even though the influence of social norms on entrepreneurial intentions is still an area of debate, few studies have discussed the direct and indirect influence of social norms on social entrepreneurial intentions (Naznen et al., 2022; Zainol et al., 2023).

Religiosity, another social norm (Stavrova et al., 2013), is also found to have a significant relation to social entrepreneurial intentions (McIntyre et al. 2023). Surprisingly, another study conducted on volunteers did not reveal any significant relation between religiosity and the formation of social entrepreneurial intention, implying that societal pressure could not influence volunteers to engage in social behavior.

Cultural value, one of the essential social norms, refers to the potential value an individual can derive from their social networks and relationships was also found to influence social entrepreneurial intentions. For example, the potential value derived from social networks could be taking over a parent’s business or getting assistance in setting up a venture from other family members. (Yang et al., 2015) observed that subjective norms influence individuals in China more than those in the USA, who are more influenced by behavioral attitudes when forming social entrepreneurial intentions, demonstrating that culture plays an essential role in SEI formation. (Aragon-Sanchez et al., 2017) Attempted to analyze the relationship between cultural capital and entrepreneurial intentions, but the study yielded inconclusive results.

Environment

The role of environment in opportunity recognition is well established in the literature. In particular, studies on the role of a regulative institutional environment on opportunity recognition confirmed that it could either be an inhibitor or an enabler. Positive perceptions of the regulative environment could act as an enabler by influencing perceived feasibility and desirability significantly, which, in turn, positively influences social entrepreneurial intentions (Kromidha et al. 2022). Other studies demonstrated that a normative institutional environment may promote opportunity recognition behavior, whereas a regulative institutional environment may harm it. They confirmed that prior experience could significantly moderate the relationship between institutional environment and social entrepreneurial intentions.

The institutional environment at the university level plays a vital role in forming social entrepreneurial intentions as we have understood the role of education in SEI formation. (Bodolica et al., 2021) Stresses the need for a sanction-free environment at the university level, where students can freely practice and improve their social entrepreneurial skills, which are the need of the hour. Information technology's role in forming social entrepreneurial intentions was also examined and concluded that it could catalyze social entrepreneurial intentions (VanSandt et al., 2009).

(Masilela et al., 2020) Attempted to understand the extent to which social grants could influence social entrepreneurial intention formation. Interestingly, the study found that social grants could have a considerable influence on starting social entrepreneurship. Surprisingly, customers of social ventures were also influenced to start a social venture with high social entrepreneurial intentions (Ip and Liang 2023), implying that customers dealing in business with or purchasing from a social venture could get motivated to start social ventures.

Social Network

Social networks could be inter-organizational linkages or interpersonal interactions and the use of social media. The former is the physical activity within a group, whereas the latter is the virtual relationship, which may exist or may be thought to exist. Social networks could include friends, family members, colleagues, and anyone with whom an individual interacts. Social networks could be entrepreneurial or non-entrepreneurial, and the influence on SEI may vary from one social network to another. Entrepreneurs interact with their social network, listen and discuss with them their opinions and opportunities, and gather information to exploit opportunities. This way, the social network also plays a vital role in creating social entrepreneurial intention.

Entrepreneurial intention is stronger when someone in the social network owns a venture and is higher if that person belongs to the individual's family-based social network rather than a friends-based social network. Xiao examined if social networks would always promote entrepreneurial intention and found that network size, network heterogeneity, and properties of top nodes significantly affect EI. Network size refers to the number of members within the social network. Large group size denotes more social relations, information, and human bridges that could instigate entrepreneurial intention. Similarly, Network heterogeneity refers to the different types of occupations of the network members. Higher network heterogeneity leads to higher heterogeneity in available information and resources. The top node refers to the occupational prestige of each network member. A high top node means high status, good wealth, reputation, and more resources at disperse. Network heterogeneity was found to have a positive effect on entrepreneurial intention. In contrast, social network size and top node properties negatively influenced entrepreneurial intentions (Xiao et al., 2014). Of late, the role of social networks in the formation of social entrepreneurial intentions has been examined by researchers. (Solórzano et al., 2022) Revealed that MOOC individuals with social entrepreneur friends or family members and perceived high support from various reference groups such as family members or teachers tend to display stronger social entrepreneurial intentions. On the other hand, networking competence, defined as the required capability a founder should possess to survive the journey, was found to have a significant effect on social entrepreneurial intentions.

Social capital was also found to influence social entrepreneurial intention considerably through proactiveness and alertness. This study elucidates that individuals with high alertness and proactiveness have high SEI, leading to opportunity recognition through social interaction. The use of social media also significantly influenced social entrepreneurial intention, leading to the establishment of social ventures at a later stage (Ip et al. 2018). Self-efficacy played a mediating role in the social media and SEI relationship (Huang et al., 2020). In particular, the effect of the famous social media WeChat on social entrepreneurial intentions was also examined, and it was found to enhance SEI through social capital.

Education

The relationship between entrepreneurial education and entrepreneurial intention was researched, and it is well established that entrepreneurship education is associated with entrepreneurial self-efficacy, which may increase entrepreneurial intention (Wilson et al., 2007). The role of education in the development of social entrepreneurial intention was first examined in 2007, a period that also saw the development of Social entrepreneurship. During this period, many studies investigated the role of education as a control variable in SEI formation (Carr et al., 2007).

Entrepreneurial education means any program or process of education that aids in developing knowledge, attitudes, and skills for entrepreneurship (Bae et al., 2014). Education can increase the confidence of individuals by providing knowledge and skills to set up social enterprises, improve entrepreneurial competencies (Jones et al., 2013), and engage in more forms of entrepreneurship (Ratten et al., 2021). (Solórzano et al., 2022) disclosed that MOOC individuals with greater knowledge of social entrepreneurship had higher social entrepreneurial intentions. Interestingly, it was found that individuals who received more education had higher confidence to start a social enterprise. Education and training have considerably influenced opportunity recognition behavior, enabling youth to convert information into useful knowledge. (Zulfiqar et al., 2021) Argued that individuals with social entrepreneurial readiness are more likely to start their ventures by seizing the right opportunities, and this could happen with education and training imparted to them. (Tran et al., 2023) showed that perceived educational support indirectly influences social entrepreneurial intention through social entrepreneurial self-efficacy.

However, most studies focussed only on the characteristics of the entrepreneurial education programs, thereby missing individual-level factors such as empathy and self-efficacy, which could only develop through experience-based programs. For this, suggested exposing students to community social problems that can be solved through entrepreneurial initiatives (Iancu et al., 2021). Entrepreneurial education combined with entrepreneurial experience could influence an individual’s ability, leading to increased SESE and Social opportunity recognition, ultimately accelerating SEI (Halberstadt et al. 2021).

Extra-curricular activities such as engaging in social clubs at the university level could also help students prepare for creating social ventures by developing SEI. These activities can be seen as a safe place to carry out trial and error in accomplishing their social entrepreneurial goals, and failure in them is well tolerated, unlike failure in the real business world (Ghalwash et al., 2017). To achieve this, universities have modified their curriculum and developed a semester-long work placement experience where students can gain social entrepreneurial experience. (Griffin et al., 2018).

While most of the studies attempted to understand the impact of social entrepreneurial education on SEI, only a few studies have focussed on the diversity of the educational background in developing SEI. The academic major could be an essential factor in influencing the entrepreneurial intention of a student. Following this, (Wu & Lingfei, 2008) found that engineering students have the highest tendency to start up ventures. However, in the case of social entrepreneurship, even non-business background students having entrepreneurial education were found to have a higher intention to engage in SEI. The same study also revealed that business-related educational background may reduce students' inclination to start social entrepreneurship due to realizing the difficulty in the venture creation process. The reverse causal effect of social entrepreneurial intention on entrepreneurship education was also examined by (Tiwari, Bhat, and Tikoria 2022), who emphasized a significant relationship between social entrepreneurship education and entrepreneurial intention.

Decisions and Outcomes

Social entrepreneurial intention can be categorized into conviction and preparation. Conviction refers to the firm belief or opinion that an individual would set up a business at some point of time in the future. In contrast, preparation refers to the activities or process that makes an individual an entrepreneur. The influence of self-efficacy on conviction is more substantial than that on preparation, confirming that confidence in oneself would increase intention formation. Entrepreneurial Creativity positively influenced conviction and preparation, whereas bonding social capital positively influenced conviction only. (I 1980) argued that entrepreneurial behavior intentions can be conditional or unconditional, in which conditional refers to specific conditions under which an individual develops the intentions.

The study found that entrepreneurial intention can lead to forming a social venture and innovation. Intentions could lead to any of the two perspectives: promotion focus, in which the individuals try to achieve the goals, and prevention focus, in which the focus is to prevent adverse outcomes. Social innovation based on co-design and co-creation by the relevant stakeholders is the outcome of social entrepreneurial intentions (Zebryte et al., 2017). The entrepreneurial intention was also found to partially mediate the relationship between opportunity recognition and the start-up phase.

Future Research Agenda

A literature review is incomplete without discussing the opportunities and directions for future research (Rowley et al., 2004), which is also a way of identifying the research gaps to be worked upon by future researchers. Future research could be conducted to address the issues and identify research gaps and challenges to deal with newly emerging concepts (Alhajri et al., 2023). Here are the proposed research directions for social entrepreneurial intention:

Does SEI develop over time?

Our literature review shows that we have witnessed relatively limited articles focussing on the outcomes of SEI compared to its antecedents. In particular, limited research has examined how social entrepreneurial intentions would develop over time and the factors that could lead to the development. We have seen the antecedents that could influence the SEI creation, but we have a limited understanding of the time taken for these antecedents to build the SEI. For this, researchers might consider employing longitudinal studies, where entrepreneurs provide daily, weekly, or repeated situational ratings of SEI over a period of a few weeks or months.

Is SEI trainable?

While most studies in entrepreneurial literature confirmed the positive effect of entrepreneurial education on entrepreneurial intention, a few studies contradicted this. (Nabi et al., 2018) confirmed that, in a few cases, entrepreneurial education could lead to a decrease in entrepreneurial intention. (Chen et al. 2015) revealed that when entrepreneurs with failure experience were engaged in mentor co-teaching, few students dropped the idea of pursuing entrepreneurship. Such studies could be conducted to test if students are willing to take up social entrepreneurship after listening to failed social entrepreneurs. One context was just education and practical experience to understand the situation, whereas the other context was students listening to failed entrepreneurs. In both contexts, education was common, but when combined with other factors, the results are different, indicating that other factors could influence the impact of education on the formation of social entrepreneurial intentions. Future studies could also analyze the influence of training with a failed SE and a successful SE.

Personality

The influence of Big Five personality types is tested on the SEI, but only limited studies explored the honesty-humility and emotionality dimensions of the HEXACO model on SEI formation. These two dimensions are found to be critical for pro-social behavior and are yet to be tested to ascertain their effects on SEI. Social and commercial entrepreneurs have similar personality traits, but what distinguishes the former from the latter is the 'social traits,' such as empathy, moral judgment, and desire to help others (Tiwari, Bhat, and Tikoria 2022). The role of positive personality types in forming social entrepreneurial intentions has already been examined. However, there is limited literature on dark triads' role in forming social entrepreneurial intentions. Narcissism positively affected entrepreneurial intentions in commercial entrepreneurship (Leung et al., 2020); a similar study could be done to understand the effect of other dark traits, such as Machiavellianism and psychopathy, on forming social entrepreneurial intentions.

Commercial (vs) Social

Prior results show that the conditions leading to the outcomes (EI and SEI) are not heterogenous but are somewhat similar even if we consider socially oriented antecedents, thereby supporting the claim that individuals regard both EIs with different foci and as high-level construals. The results also demonstrate no differences within gender, but there are asymmetries between gender in the configurations leading to EI and SEI. One research area could be how social entrepreneurial intentions form for commercial entrepreneurs. If SEIs are formed, would commercial entrepreneurs start a social or a commercial venture? Very few studies have examined the commercial venture owners forming social ventures and the antecedents that lead to that decision, leaving room for further research.

Age

Few studies have examined an individual's age (later life) and its effect on forming social entrepreneurial intentions. Future studies could integrate other aging-related individual variables such as generativity, death anxiety, and perceived health on SEI.

Social Media’s role

The role of social media in the formation of social entrepreneurial intentions is still an under-researched area. Prior Research was only done on a social networking app, WeChat. However, social networking apps such as FB, Instagram, and Twitter could be analyzed to understand their influence on SEI.

Opportunity recognition

Researchers have different views regarding opportunity recognition and intention relationships. Although very little literature is available on the opportunity recognition and entrepreneurial intention relationship (Hassan et al. 2020), few scholars consider opportunity recognition as an antecedent for predicting entrepreneurial intention, while other scholars have shown it as the successor to the entrepreneurial intention process (Asante et al., 2019). Most studies focussed on the antecedents of social entrepreneurial intention formation, but very few focused on the time taken to convert these intentions to behavior. Also, the sample size was primarily students inspired to take up social entrepreneurship. However, there needed to be a follow-up study with the sample to understand how many of them started a social venture.

Limitations and Conclusion

Even though we tried to develop a conceptual framework for social entrepreneurial intention with this study, this research still has some things that could be improved. First, in establishing clear boundaries for the study, we had to consciously decide the exclusion and inclusion criteria at each step of the review. We have taken a reductionist approach to exclude books, conference proceedings, and other 'grey literature' (Briner et al., 2012) that underwent no peer-review process. Second, the review considered only the articles published in 'English' by excluding articles published in other languages. We concede that there could have been relevant literature in the excluded articles, which might have been helpful to the review. Nevertheless, the exclusion was necessary to ensure the validity of the review.

Despite the recent spike in published articles on social entrepreneurship intention, only a few recent systematic literature reviews focus on this topic. A systematic review helps future researchers understand the content and evolution of SEI. We examined 80 articles related to SEI published in peer-reviewed and highly cited journals and provided a comprehensive framework including the antecedents, decisions, and outcomes of social entrepreneurial intentions. Our review contributes to the literature in two folds: First, the article provides a comprehensive overview of the research carried out on SEI, which scholars can utilize to further their research in SEI. We have identified the antecedents and classified them into situational and dispositional factors, which were further classified. Second, the significant contribution is in terms of discussion and presentation of actionable future research agenda, which can advance the area further.

Research funding: This research was not funded.

Disclosure statement: The authors report there are no competing interests to declare.

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Received: 24-Nov-2024, Manuscript No. amsj-24-15482; Editor assigned: 25-Nov-2024, PreQC No. amsj-24-15482(PQ); Reviewed: 20-Jan-2025, QC No. amsj-24-15482; Revised: 26-Feb-2025, Manuscript No. amsj-24-15482(R); Published: 01-Mar-2025