AUTHOR=Shan Tingting , Tian Xiaoya 

TITLE=The effects of social capital on entrepreneurial resilience of SME from China: A moderated mediation model of entrepreneurial passion and Confucian traditional golden-mean thinking

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology

VOLUME=Volume 13 - 2022

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.961824

DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2022.961824

ISSN=1664-1078

ABSTRACT=Small and medium sized start-ups are playing a crucial role in a country 'sustainable development. Compared with intra-company entrepreneurship, SMEs tend to suffer from especially high failure rates because of a lot of constraints, including lack of resources and credit to access the core information. SMEs are at an early development stage, which also means weaker institutional norms and successful paradigms. The higher the environment uncertainty, the more likely that new start-ups rely on all kinds of social links for acquiring resources. As a key ability to withstand and overcome obstacles, entrepreneurial resilience is an important personal characteristic to ensure the sustainability of the new ventures. However, prior research pays little attention to understand whether and how SME entrepreneurs’ social capital help them to cultivate and promote the entrepreneurial resilience. The purpose of this study is to investigate the internal mechanism through which SME entrepreneurs’ social capital affects entrepreneurial resilience. To reveal the internal mechanism, we propose a moderated and mediation model of entrepreneurial passion and Confucian traditional golden-mean thinking. Using survey data from SEM entrepreneurs in China, hierarchical regression analysis and bootstrapping model are adapted to test and verify mediation and moderation effects. The results show that social capital indeed positively influence entrepreneurial resilience directly and partly through the mediating effect of harmonious entrepreneurial passion and obsessive entrepreneurial passion. Moreover, findings suggest Confucian traditional golden-mean thinking negatively moderates the relationship between obsessive entrepreneurial passion and entrepreneurial resilience, yet positively moderates the relationship between social capital and entrepreneurial resilience. Based on these findings, we conclude that entrepreneurial resilience may be achieved more effectively through the internal complex process of social capital, passion entrepreneurial passion and Confucian traditional golden-mean thinking. Finally, the study proposes the theoretical and practical implications and suggestions for follow-up research.