Entrepreneurship Education in Fragile Contexts: Bridging the Intention–Action Gap Through Psychological and Contextual Pathways

Abed Alfattah Albatran () and Tolga Atikbay
Additional contact information
Abed Alfattah Albatran: Department of Business Management, Faculty of Business and Economics, Girne American University, Mersin 10, Girne 99300, Turkey
Tolga Atikbay: Department of Business Management, Faculty of Business and Economics, Girne American University, Mersin 10, Girne 99300, Turkey

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 16, 1-16

Abstract: In fragile and unstable regions, entrepreneurship education is increasingly viewed as the path to economic resilience and youth empowerment. However, research indicates that there is relatively little empirical evidence on how entrepreneurial education promotes entrepreneurial intention and behavior, especially in situations of uncertainty and a lack of resources. This study explores this relationship based on a sample of 402 Palestinian university students and graduates, applying the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM). The study concludes that entrepreneurial education has a positive influence on students’ self-efficacy, attitudes toward entrepreneurship, and their perception of the entrepreneurial environment. Self-efficacy was found to be the most potent mediating factor of entrepreneurial intent, closely followed by attitude. Although intention is a good predictor of action, the relationship is modest, which illustrates a clear intention-action gap. The study also reports that entrepreneurial education indirectly affects actions by shaping environmental perception, and that its total influence on entrepreneurial action operates primarily through these psychological and contextual pathways. Furthermore, the availability of resources has a significant moderating effect, as students having strong intentions are more likely to act when there is a strong perception that sufficient support and resources are available to them. The research builds on the Theory of Planned Behavior and complements related work on the intention–action gap, by considering a combination of psychological and contextual influences. Additionally, it offers actionable recommendations for policy-makers, educators, and development practitioners working to realize youth aspiration in fragile economies through integrated, context-appropriate entrepreneurship interventions.

Keywords: entrepreneurship education; entrepreneurial intention; entrepreneurial action; self-efficacy; resource availability; entrepreneurial environment; fragile context (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/16/7447/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/16/7447/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:16:p:7447-:d:1726665

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().