Introduction

Generally, entrepreneurship is establishing a new company or revitalising an established business to capitalise on new opportunities. Entrepreneurship is now an internationally recognised innovation process mobilising people and resources (Tripathi & Singh, 2017). In the previous few decades, women’s employment and economic growth efforts have significantly increased. Female entrepreneurship is among the most potent engines encouraging empowerment, job creation, development, and economic growth (Laudano et al., 2019b). Although females have begun to show a significant interest in business ventures, we continue to see a decline in the quantity of women handicraft entrepreneurs in several emerging economies due to cultural differences. There is a lack of proper training and skill education provided to females. This is the opposite in the case of men because there is an enormous scope of skill training, and vocational education is provided to males interested in starting a new business (Chatterjee et al., 2018). Previous data also reveals that females receive less attention and appreciation than their male colleagues in starting a new business in any sector. This could be credited to various reasons, adding that entrepreneurship is dominated by men, a lack of women’s education and skill training, and low confidence among females in their capacity to succeed in handicraft sector entrepreneurship (AlMunajjed, 2019; Ribeiro-Soriano, 2017).

Although women significantly impact the global economy, there is limited research on female handicraft entrepreneurship. The research on female entrepreneurship comprises smaller investors, which refers to establishing a new company or revitalising a present enterprise to capitalise on new prospects (Welsh et al., 2014; Meyer & Hamilton, 2020). In the digital era, the role of females in the household or handmade industry is increasing yearly because they contribute to family income and increase India’s GDP (Chowdhury et al., 2018). Entrepreneurship run by females is regarded as one of the most potent engines for employment generation, economic growth and women empowerment and inclusive development of rural businesses run by females (Yadav et al., 2022a). Even though female entrepreneurs show a significant interest in entrepreneurial activities, many developing countries and their cultures show a significant and continuous decline in the quantity of ladies’ engagement as entrepreneurs in the handicraft sector. According to Mehtap et al. (2017), women are not given the same education and training opportunities as males interested in starting a new business. Female entrepreneurship research accounts for fewer than 10% of all research. However, new academic interest in women’s handmade ownership has sparked many studies in India, focusing on identifying entrepreneurial attributes and overcoming hurdles (Chatterjee et al., 2018; Khan, 2019).

Furthermore, while female labour-force participation in India reached 17.5 % in 2019, the unemployment rate in women was 41.9 % in 2019 (Bazan et al., 2019). "Female entrepreneurship index" released by Garman-watch in 2015, the number of female entrepreneurs in the top three countries is the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom, and the position of India is 54th out of 77 countries worldwide. Indian women craft entrepreneurs continue to encounter several hurdles and social and cultural barriers that prevent females from entering business marketing (Yadav et al., 2022b). According to research, female entrepreneurs face more hurdles than their male counterparts in the Indian traditional and patriarchal communities (Kamberidou, 2020). In earlier research, studies are scarce on several factors affecting female entrepreneurial inclinations in emerging economies, especially India (Yadav et al., 2020). Realistically, women’s labour-force participation is a high objective in India’s national development strategy, and various national and private programmes are underway to boost women’s labour-force involvement. For example, the Ministry of Skill development and entrepreneurship (MSDE) that was established by the Government of India for the promotion of skill development and entrepreneurship among young Indian men/women to become entrepreneurs.

Similarly, the Centenary Fund, a non-profit institution, assists young women in India with grants, finance and funds for their interest in craft projects. Similarly, the Indian Institute of carpet technology Bhadohi, an Indian institute of entrepreneurship and skill development programme, fosters training and entrepreneurial culture for young female research scholars involved in entrepreneurship. Furthermore, Baba Shahab University Lucknow and the Indian Institute of skill development entrepreneurship, Kanpur, and Ahmadabad have established the incubation centre, Entrepreneurial and Business Innovation Research Centre and started to train and teach young craft women in the growth of handmade entrepreneurship. Similarly, the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, Indian Institute of skill development, Entrepreneurship Ahmedabad, IIT Delhi, the national institution for transforming India (NITI) Ayog, New Delhi, have created a variety of programmes and scholarships to help women develop their entrepreneurial skills and talents (Tripathi & Singh, 2017).

Furthermore, the India “Vision 2047” document has been published by NITI Aayog. It is planned to take females to new heights of economic empowerment and leadership in a very particular and deliberate manner (Yadav et al., 2022b). However, this goal cannot be realised without studying and knowing what the young Indian generation of women desires and what influences them to become employers transforming from workers. Due to non-interest or research in women’s entrepreneurship, especially in the handicraft sector, there is a fundamental problem in understanding how young female students want to pursue business and degrees in entrepreneurship; there is a lack of study. Future studies should listen to the experiences of Indian women who want to start businesses, and this article proposes a study to observe the negative impact of factors by analysing the motivations of female college graduates to start their businesses.

Indian handmade industry and the role of women in the handmade industry

The Indian handicraft industry is one of the oldest traditional and religious industries, the backbone of the Indian economy since the Mauryan period. It is a sustainable, durable, utility-driven, decorative industry and has a vast export history at the global level (Yadav et al., 2020). In the Mughal period, the share of this industry was 33% of world exports, but after the discovery of machines, the industry’s value decreased yearly. Now the share of the global handicraft industry is only 0.8 % of the global GDP, and the women workforce in the handicraft industry is growing slowly. They are transforming themselves from workers to entrepreneurs (Joshi & Dhar, 2022), and different characteristics affect the Indian handicraft industry to be the hub of the global handicraft sector. These factors are advanced technology, women’s involvement, and a special economic zone for the handicraft industry with the help of government motivation to this sector (Khan et al., 2021).

Indian handicraft sector comprises a large population living in rural and tribal areas, where most craft work is designed. Most of the women are involved in the handicraft industry in these areas. When the production of craft products will be demand by consumers, artisans will make products as per their demand (Yadav et al., 2020). Craftspeople, like those at the Shelf Help Group and other nongovernmental organisations, also referred to as (NGOs) led by Indian women, will be in demand. Workers will be able to make decent money thanks to the rising demand for goods and the subsequent increase in consumer spending (Shafi et al., 2021).

Significance of the study

This study has multiple implications for philosophy and practice for women’s entrepreneurial development in the handicraft sector. This is the first empirical study to conduct a systematic literature review on entrepreneurship related to females and propose multiple dimensions for future study. Secondly, it examines the factors—including education towards entrepreneurship, anticipated support from society, self-efficacy, innovativeness, benevolence, and so on—that contribute to young women’s desire and behaviour in the realm of entrepreneurship, drawing from theoretical models like the Entrepreneurial Event Model and the Planned Behaviour Theory. This study gives the idea to workers, entrepreneurs and the government to set up their businesses in such a way as to increase the income of individuals and the GDP of the country with employment generation. It will give the women entrepreneurs financial empowerment and happiness on the face of the women. Finally, this study has implications for educational institutions and other public and private institutions, including the government, in promoting such levels of Education and programmes. It includes training and hands-on skill development as part of the overall curriculum to encourage professional female students to take an interest in an entrepreneurial career in the craft industry (Brush & Cooper, 2012).

This study significantly contributes to small and medium enterprises led by women, especially in the handicraft sector in India and at the global level. This will help researchers, policymakers, and managers make the right decisions for promoting and developing the handicraft sector. This will increase the employment generation, happiness level, and women empowerment and finally increase the GDP.

Literature review

The literature study helps understand the evolution of the literature on female entrepreneurship and identifies gaps in existing research. The phrases "female entrepreneurship" or "female entrepreneur" are comprehensive enough to pull up any research on the topic" they were searched throughout the abstract, title of the article, and keywords in the Scopus database, yielding 1,169 results. Because many papers were not directly related to this research, the search query was further restricted by including the keyword "intention" in it. This yielded 47 articles, with full access granted to 30 empirical papers that explored the factors influencing female entrepreneurs’ inclination to launch a new enterprise. These studies served as a foundation for reviewing and identifying research gaps. Shabsough et al. (2021), for example, sought to comprehend gender variations in entrepreneurial goals. The proposed model was developed using feminist theory, the theory of planned behaviour, and institutional theory. According to the findings, Bulgarian female university students had lower entrepreneurial inclinations than men. Fallatah (2012) sought to determine whether there is a deviation in entrepreneurial inclinations between men and women scholars in India.

The study examined first-year business students at a Women’s College in India. The data revealed that both men and women students had a significant desire to become future entrepreneurs. However, female students demonstrated more robust risk-taking behaviour than male students, contradicting previous research findings that female students were more conservative regarding risk-taking than males. They sought to investigate the impact of gender disparities among potential entrepreneurs, their psychosocial features, and the enticements and significant hurdles female entrepreneurs face when launching a new venture. The study included 1400 students from IIM Ahmadabad. According to the data, women entrepreneurs are less likely to establish a business, and fear of failure is a significant barrier to starting a new venture. Bhatti et al. (2021) sought to investigate the data of knowledge and assistance for Indian female owners embarking on a new venture.

The research revealed that women are crucial in most (52%) female-dominated enterprises (Abebe & Kegne, 2023; Chaudhary et al., 2018). According to Table 2, 70% of women own more than 51% of firms, while 41% started the business independently. The findings also revealed that Indian handicraft entrepreneurs are less educated, especially in the skill and technology stream. Still, they are much more friendly, emotional, and supportive. In terms of traditional skills, they are highly dedicated to carft and traditional work, innovative in Teamwork. They are advanced in concept, design development, product invention, and fundamental management. Bhatti et al. (2021) wanted to see if there is a gender difference in the relationship between entrepreneurial objectives and personality. The findings indicate that the degree of entrepreneurial ambitions differs by gender, with males showing more inclinations toward venture development than women.

In addition, the results showed that self-efficacy’ is not a significant factor in determining entrepreneurial aspirations across sexes. Alonso-Galicia et al. (2015), using the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) and another existing model, entrepreneurial intents (EI), studied the effect of gender on Spanish academics’ views about the commercialisation of their research outputs. The results showed that males and females had different perspectives on the effects of private social networks, particularly the help with managing one’s attitude and behaviour to foster EI Female tourism students’ aspirations to become entrepreneurs were studied (Sandhu et al., 2021). The results showed that students’ entrepreneurial intentions and subjective norms toward self-employment improved towards the end of the tourism curriculum, although they had been poor initially. A Spanish professor explained the influence of online communities on entrepreneurial intention (EI) (Vrontis et al., 2022). The results showed that male and female academics have different views on the importance of having a support network and using available resources when starting a business. High-level entrepreneurship in Europe was studied by Fernandez-Perez et al. (2015) both before and after the financial crisis of 2008.

The research results pointed out that opportunities related to the handicraft business significantly impacted entrepreneurship during the recession period in emerging economies. The results also showed that gender disparities significantly affected entrepreneurs’ ambitions for rapid expansion during the recession, with women faring worse than men. Researchers in Iran (Giotopoulos et al., 2017; Chowdhury et al., 2018) looked into what drives women business owners and managers to work from home. The data suggest that women are motivated mainly by intrinsic factors like the pursuit of independence and self-achievement, the display of knowledge, and the overcoming of socio-cultural challenges. Money worries, contractual opportunities, positive feedback, and the challenges of working from home all have an extrinsic effect on them. The factors affecting the expansion goals of Indian women business owners have also been studied (Yadav et al., 2022c; Modarresi et al., 2016). The results showed that their abilities were essential and that having family support mediated the relationship between their growth mindset and their growth goals.

Ribeiro-Soriano (2017) wanted to see what Indian women students are involved in the handicraft business. He thought about Social and cultural challenges to entrepreneurial innovation. Based on a sample of 254 from 5 Indian institutions where female students are most involved in a study about female entrepreneurship show that an excellent supporting education system may lower anticipated potential hurdles to entrepreneurship—investigated the impact of female handmade entrepreneurial goals on creativity. The findings revealed that creativity is a crucial predictor of entrepreneurial ambitions. That family background is more favourable to entrepreneurial endeavours (Mylonas et al., 2017) suggested a model incorporating technology aspects into the TPB to better assess women’s handicraft entrepreneurship intentions, particularly in the case of India. The conceptual study will be validated with data collected to interpret the impact of various factors on the entrepreneurial intentions of Indian women. Ferri et al. (2018) and Aleidi & Chandran (2018) observed the Arebiyan female intention regarding handicraft entrepreneurship. According to the findings, societal pressure and anticipated behavioural control influenced their desire to become entrepreneurs.

Similarly, Sandhu et al. (2021) sought to investigate how entrepreneurial colleges might accelerate entrepreneurial activity in women by focusing on contextual aspects, personality traits, and psychological and entrepreneurial activity that reassure entrepreneurial intention. The findings suggested that universities dedicated to entrepreneurial teaching and research have significantly influenced women’s antecedent feasibility entrepreneurial attitudes and ambitions in European countries like Albania and Italy. Furthermore, the need for independence was a significant element in the Italian sample, but the need for achievement was significant in the Albanian sample (Laudano et al., 2018a; de Castro Krakauer et al., 2018; Ahmad et al., 2018). They Investigated the impact of the entrepreneurial profile of Brazilian women on their motivation to establish a business. According to the research, the behavioural categories that have the more impact on the intention of entrepreneurship in Brazilian women include sociability, planning, leadership, and spotting opportunities. The theory that a woman’s entrepreneurial profile influences her objectives was also proven. Laudano et al. (2018a) investigated when entrepreneurial Education is included in the system and how gender inequalities change entrepreneurial intentions.

The data suggested that there is an adverse effect of Feminist perception among students who are female ’EI rather than the type of programmes. van Ewijk, Belghiti-Mahut (2019) tried to investigate female craft entrepreneurs’ attitudes toward entrepreneurship, examine the entrepreneurial intentions among students, and measure the impact of entrepreneurial orientation towards the handmade industry. Their findings revealed that craft-related entrepreneurship education was significant for female students with a propensity for entrepreneurship as a career goal. Prabha Devi et al. (2019) and Tlaiss (2015) sought to investigate the factors that encourage entrepreneurial mindsets in women in India. According to the data, government and entrepreneurship training are the most important factors influencing women to become entrepreneurs. Khan (2019) investigated the impact of non-Religious marriages, which do not follow the norm of tradition and culture, such as love marriage, court marriage, arranged marriage, and forced marriage. This female moves toward entrepreneurship either in the handicraft sector or other sectors. Muhammad et al. (2019) examined EI among the students of an Indian women’s university.

The findings revealed that entrepreneurial mentality, societal norms, skill training capacity, behavioural control, and entrepreneurial Education affect the entrepreneurs willing to start a business in the craft industry. Anwar et al. (2020) and Onalan & Magda (2020) have investigated the effect of motivational perseverance on intolerance to uncertainty in female entrepreneurs versus non-entrepreneurs. According to the findings, female entrepreneurs demonstrated more motivational perseverance in following stable and existing goals. They try to attain their goal rather than the non-entrepreneurial goal. Ferdousi & Mahmud (2019) and Meyer & Hamilton (2020) have sought to compare the diversity in various traditional entrepreneurial aspects between those females working with a degree and those who did not have a degree but were entrepreneurs. According to the findings, business growth variables, goal to build the business, External motivation, entrepreneurial Education, and training all provided statistically significant values (Onalan & Magda, 2020). The findings have investigated the function of a network of social terms in regulating the link between adhesive floor opinion (i.e., an unseen barrier that hinders women since growing a particular level of the given organisations afar) and women entrepreneurs’ EI. Social networking has a larger favourable link with EI in women with a high sticky floor impression (Shabsough et al., 2021; Poggesi et al., 2020). They investigated the elements that influence EI and innovation in the craft industry. The analysis indicated that risk-taking attitudes, subjective norms, empowerment, and self-efficacy substantially influence women’s EI in the hotel business. Yoopetch (2020) assessed the difference in cognitive characteristics before and after a training programme and Education in entrepreneurship, especially in the handicraft sector, besides the effect of cognitive characteristics on EI among females in India.

According to the findings, entrepreneurial training and training programmes significantly improve female students’ EI and psychological characteristics. On another side, it was discovered that psychological characteristics such as self-confidence, ambiguity tolerance, training retention, innovativeness, and motivation for accomplishment have positively impacted EI. Bhatti et al. (2021) reviewed the literature on entrepreneurship and gender appeared to be one of the most protuberant variables related to demography thus the male engagement is more significant than female entrepreneurship, despite female entrepreneurship being on the rise (Kock et al., 2021; Sandhu et al., 2021). It was proposed that Education in entrepreneurship, involvement in business conferences, workshops at IIT, IIM, NIT, IISC, or universities, and female students’ participation in the advanced events and advance centre might help female scholars from India’s EI. The study also discovered that all three educational events improved their EI (Kumar et al., 2022; Alferaih, 2017; Shahin et al., 2021). They observed the EI female students from secondary schools in Australia. Skills and personality development, explicitly in craft making stone carving gems, jewellery, wooden work, paper product, jute bag making, pottery industry, etc., by risk-taking creative thinking, leadership development, and problem-solving, was discovered to be a crucial factor affecting young female students’ entrepreneurial views. According to a survey of all known research on female entrepreneurship, they have employed a variety of empirical investigations to determine their aspirations to establish a firm (Venugopal, 2016; Yadav & Unni, 2016; Ezeh et al., 2019).

However, research on the crucial components that originate from the underlying theoretical models is lacking. A model to evaluate women’s aspirations to start their businesses is proposed, with inventiveness and expected social support among the critical contextual factors. These women attend Indian public universities for various degree levels (Schlaegel & Koenig, 2014).

Conceptual foundation, hypothesis development, and proposed conceptual model

There are two Research models used in the proposal of the conceptual model. First is the Theory of Planned Behaviour(TPB) (Alonso-Galicia et al., 2015; Mylonas et al., 2017), and second is the Entrepreneurial Event Model (Aleidi & Chandran, 2018; Fitzsimmons & Douglas, 2011) has been used in the past to decipher people’s entrepreneurial intentions and actions. Other scholars have argued that combining TPB with EEM will yield better outcomes and overall performance (Ajzen, 1991; Schlaegel & Koenig, 2014). In this paper, we’ll take a comprehensive look at the EEM and TPB to see how they fit together and then offer a research model that makes more sense.

Theory of planned behaviour (TPB)

The most popular, commonly studied psychological approach is the TPB, which asserts that an anticipated behavioural control (ABC), subjective norm, and an individual’s attitude influence intentions, eventually shaping the total behaviour (Yadav et al., 2022d; Gieure et al., 2019; Urban & Kujinga, 2017). The amount to which a person has a positive or negative perspective and viewpoint on a subject or behaviour is their attitude toward behaviour. TPB is another crucial concept, the subjective model, which indicates the heaviness put on a person due to their references, such as relatives, colleagues, co-workers, and so on, whether or not to conduct a specific nature. Finally, anticipated applied control, the final construct, reflects how complex or straightforward the behaviour in question is seen to be. According to this Model, the intention of individuals to do a specific action grows under their anticipated skill, and human beings begin entrepreneurial events, which wish they have enough skill to start an enterprise and such creativity is acceptable in our society (Gurel et al., 2010; Shapero & Sokol, 1982).

This model has been suggested and empirically evaluated in various research (e.g., Devonish et al., 2010; Sharahiley (2020)) to analyse individuals’ purpose in thinking of new business). Another empirical model thoroughly explored in the entrepreneurial literature is the entrepreneurial event model. It also includes three fundamental constructs: (anticipated feasibility, anticipated inclination, and inclination to act), all of which affect the inspiration of entrepreneurs, also called entrepreneurial intention in the handicraft industry or other industries (Foss et al., 2019; Karimi et al., 2013).

Anticipated feasibility is the elaborate degree to which a person believes in their ability to launch a new venture and thinks doing so is a viable career option. Similarly, the anticipated desirability, the degree to which an individual is fully confident to launch a new business, might be considered the intensity with which they wish to do so after carefully weighing all relevant factors. In evaluating an appropriate action, the propensity to act is a once predisposition to launch a novel business (Giménez & Calabrò, 2018; Guerrero et al., 2008; Schlaegel and Koenig, 2014).

Several additional studies have provided the TPB-EEM-based cohesive research standard to gauge an individual’s propensity to launch a handicraft business. For instance, the TPB-EEM-based integrated research model was shown to be the best model for investigating entrepreneurism tendencies in a meta-analysis of 130 studies (Alferaih, 2017). After further testing with primary data, it was found (De Clercq & Brieger, 2022; Sharahiley, 2020) that the integrated model significantly outperformed the component models, with significantly greater exploratory power. (Kumar et al., 2022), Alferaih (2017), Laudano et al. (2018b) provided an integrated model of EEM and TPB built upon a meta-analysis of 95 papers alongside 130 samples and demonstrated the model’s additional exploratory capacity through that procedure. The integrated TPB and EEM model also suggests an integrated model that considers the existing body of data and the stability of the combined model.

The suggested model incorporates all three central concepts from the TPB (attitude, PCB, and subjective norm) and the two central concepts from the EEM (anticipated feasibility and anticipated desirability). External variables like innovativeness and anticipated social support also have a role in shaping EB. The selection of innovativeness and felt social support is primarily grounded in the goals of this study. Women business owners, for instance, are 5% more likely to be inventive than men (Majumdar & Varadarajan, 2013).

As a result, it is essential to examine the success of innovation in India as a new entrepreneurial environment where the government is adaptable enough to provide women with every business advantage. To investigate whether female business owners receive the typical amount of social support, an extra construct of “perceived social support” was introduced (Younis et al., 2020). The proposed research paradigm includes nine hypothesis: four mediation hypothesis and eight direct hypotheses. Figure 1 presents the proposed research paradigm together with the appropriate direction.

Fig. 1: Proposed research model.
Fig. 1: Proposed research model.
Full size image

In Figure 1, Nine hypothesis are included in the suggested research paradigm, including eight direct hypothesis and four mediation hypotheses, showing the conceptual hypothesis model. In this model, External variables are innovativeness and anticipated social support. It also includes external characteristics such as anticipated social support and innovativeness to impact entrepreneurial activity. The proposed mode presents all of the TPB’s fundamental concepts—attitude, ACB, and subjective norm. The suggested model incorporates all variables, such as anticipated behavioural control, subjective norm, and attitude, as well as the EEM’s two fundamental constructs, anticipated feasibility and anticipated attractiveness. Source: Adapted from (Ajzen, 1991; Shapero & Sokol, 1982; Tripathi et al., 2020).

Research gap

From the literature review, it has been clear that many studies have been done on entrepreneurial intention, entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial antecedent and entrepreneurial attitude in industrial and small-scale industries, even though much research has been done in global scenarios related to the handicraft sector and entrepreneurship. But applying innovativeness and digitalisation in the Indian handicraft sector and its impact on women entrepreneurs has not been available. There is also a gap between its financial impact on new craft entrepreneurs. In India, studies are related to students and professionals studying entrepreneurship and female entrepreneurial behaviour in the handicraft sector, but there is a lack of study. So in this article, we have tried to understand and investigate the antecedent impact of entrepreneurial behaviour, attitude, subjective norm, and antecedent of social support on women entrepreneurship. We hope this study will support the research, industrialist and other students in this field.

This study also suggests an integrated model based on these distinct models, considering past evidence and the robustness of the model combining the EEM and TPB. The suggested model incorporates all of the TPB’s essential components, such as anticipated behavioural control, subjective norm, and attitude, as well as the EEM’s two fundamental constructs, anticipated feasibility and anticipated attractiveness. It also includes external characteristics such as anticipated social support and innovativeness to impact entrepreneurial activity (Laudano et al., 2018a, b). All three of the TPB’s fundamental concepts—attitude, ACB, and subjective norm—are present in the proposed model, as are the EEM’s two central concepts—anticipated feasibility and anticipated inclination. External variables like innovativeness, digitalisation, and anticipated social support also shape EB. Most justification for using innovativeness and anticipated social support comes from the study’s setting. Previous studies have found, for instance, that Indian female entrepreneurs are 8% more likely to be inventive than male entrepreneurs (Yadav et al., 2022b). As a result, examining the success of innovation in India is essential. A new entrepreneurial environment where the government is adaptable enough to offer full support to women business owners. To investigate whether female business owners receive the typical amount of social support, an extra construct of “Anticipated social support” was introduced (Younis et al., 2020). Nine hypotheses are included in the suggested research paradigm. Figure 1 depicts the proposed research hypothesis.

Proposed hypothesis

Entrepreneurial intention and anticipated feasibility

Anticipated feasibility is a person’s impression of the potential future circumstances linked with launching a new endeavour. It is also related to an individual level of confidence in his ability to become a successful entrepreneur (Schlaegel & Koenig, 2014). Several other researchers have validated the influence of anticipated feasibility on entrepreneurial intention through meta-analytic review (Martínez-Rodríguez et al., 2022; Guerrero et al., 2008) and empirical validation. As an output of the given debate, the authors have proposed the following Hypothesis:

H1: Anticipated feasibility affects entrepreneurial intention positively.

Anticipated inclination vs. entrepreneurial intention

The desire to set up a new venture is an anticipated inclination (Sharahiley, 2020). Existing research supports the positive association between anticipated and entrepreneurial inclination (Schlaegel & Koenig, 2014; Tripathi et al., 2022). As a result, the authors present the following Hypothesis:

H2. Anticipated inclination significantly affects a person’s intention to establish a new business.

Entrepreneurial intention and attitude related to skill learning

Attitude is "the extent to which an entrepreneur adopts a confirmatory or contradictory evaluation of starting a new business" (Prabha Devi et al., 2019). The more someone says they want to establish a business, the more likely they will do so independently (Aizen, 1991). In consumer behaviour, marketing, information systems, psychology, etc., prior research has demonstrated that attitude is a crucial predictor of intention. The following theory could be advanced based on the preceding considerations:

H3: An attitude positively affects the individual’s entrepreneurial intention toward entrepreneurship

Subjective norm and entrepreneurial intention

By bringing together the individual or friends about positive or negative judgement, group members represent some subjective norms with others, such as relatives, colleagues, and others, who may impact the choice to launch a business by that individual in the issue. The subjective norm highlights that favourable feedback from an individual in their close group may reinforce their entrepreneurial spirit. The opposite may be true if the review is negative (Bazan et al., 2019; Anwar & Saleem, 2019). According to the literature, women’s subjective norms for entrepreneurship are higher than men’s. This leads us to propose the following solution.

H4: Subjective norms directly affect the entrepreneurial intention

Entrepreneurial behaviour and innovation

According to Gurol and Atsan (2006), the literature on entrepreneurship significantly emphasises innovation. Business owners are referred to as pioneers in almost every piece of writing ever written about entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurs can put their original ideas to use to build their companies through a process known as innovation, a specific tool. The Hypothesis that entrepreneurs are more digitally savvy and innovative in the craft business than non-entrepreneurs has been substantiated by several studies that used empirical evidence to test the Hypothesis (Laudano et al., 2018a; Anggadwita & Dhewanto, 2015). As a direct consequence of this, the following theory is put forward:

H5. Their innovativeness positively influences individuals’ entrepreneurial behaviour in the craft industry.

Entrepreneurial behaviour based on anticipated social support

Anticipated social support is defined as how entrepreneurial behaviour and everyday society may help individuals to fulfil their social mission (Xiongfei et al., 2019). It creates a sense of acceptance that they are cared for and respected by society and thus influences an individual’s behaviour successful entrepreneur in the craft industry (Anggadwita & Dhewanto, 2015). Based on the following considerations, the developed Hypothesis might be as follows:

H6: Anticipated social support affects an individual’s entrepreneurial behaviour positively.

Entrepreneurial behaviour and anticipated behavioural control

According to Cooke and Sheeran (2004), an individual’s self-efficacy or ability to do a particular activity is an example of expected behavioural control. According to Malebana (2014), a person’s behaviour can be impacted not only by the person but also by external control forces like opportunity, resource availability, and particular abilities. It is a way of thinking about whether or not any factors can aid or impede an individual from carrying out a specific action. Based on this information, the following Hypothesis may be made as a consequence:

H7: Individuals’ entrepreneurial behaviour is positively influenced by their perception of behavioural control.

Entrepreneurial desire and entrepreneurial action

There has not been much empirical research that supports the individual decision and impact of entrepreneurial goals to start a business (Krueger, 1993). However, studies that have looked into this association have found it significant. This study also contends women’s stronger intention is to start a new business, and his type of desire is reflected in their activity. As a result, the following theory could be proposed:

H8. Entrepreneurial intent promotes entrepreneurial conduct positively.

The objective of the study

The main objective of this study is to compare the performance of the TPB, EEM and the contextual elements employed in this study to those found in the entrepreneurship literature under varying conditions to conclude the efficacy of the proposed model. To study the evaluation of factors that affect Indian female entrepreneurship.

Research methodology

Sample and data

The information was acquired from female students enrolled in various professional business and entrepreneurial courses at the diploma, undergraduate, and postgraduate levels at some Indian state and private universities. We gathered the data from students studying business and entrepreneurship-related subjects in Indian universities. The total numbers of item were 36. For this, we applied convenience sampling during data collection. The items in the questionnaire were both types (open-ended as well as closed-ended). There has been used 7 points Likert scale that is strongly agreed to disagree (1–7 points) strongly.

Furthermore, the questionnaire included nine questions on respondents’ demographic characteristics. Online questionnaires were forwarded through Google Form Link among students and professionals. The sampling area and target area were reputed Indian national universities, IITs, and NITs that MBA and entrepreneurship programmes offer. Items of the questionnaire are given in Table 1.

Table 1 Measure for items mentioned in the questionnaire.
Full size table

The respondents were mainly higher education students and young professionals in the handicraft sectors. 631 questionnaires were distributed to students from various cohorts, and 482 responses were received. It was observed that 53 such questionnaires were filled out using the same option for every question and served as the foundation for data analysis.

Foundation of construct

The existing scale inherited from previous studies was used to operationalise the constructs and collect data in this study. Nine constructs were operationalized to analyse and measure the aggregated components, and their respective measures were applied. TPB core constructs such as attitude, subjective norms, and anticipated behavioural control was employed, whereas EEM essential constructs such as anticipated feasibility and inclination were used. In addition, we used crucial mediating and dependent factors from TPB, such as entrepreneurial intention and conducted (Linan, 2008). Along with these integrated models, we examined the effects of additional variables on entrepreneurial activity, such as innovativeness and anticipated social support. We did, however, derive the measures for entrepreneurial intention from the works of (Linan, 2008; Krueger, 1993) because they were already stated precisely in the context of the entrepreneurship literature. The items for the TPB’s core constructs, such as attitude, anticipated behavioural control, and subjective norm, along with some dependent variables (i.e., entrepreneurial intention and entrepreneurial behaviour), were derived (Alferaih, 2017). In contrast, the items for the EEM, including anticipated feasibility and anticipated inclination, were derived (Hair et al., 2010).

Respondents’ demographic characteristics

As previously stated, 430 valid responses were gathered for the final analysis, consisting of all female students with entrepreneurial knowledge and experience. In terms of age, between 20 to 25 years (243, 56.64%), 18 and 20 years (i.e., 90, 20.98%), 25–30 years (i.e., 49, 11.42%), and 30 years and over (i.e., 47, 10.96%). In terms of Education, the majority of respondents (359, 83.68%) were pursuing an undergraduate degree, followed by a postgraduate degree (58, 13.52%), and the least number of respondents (12, 2.80%) were pursuing a diploma degree. Regarding professional Education, the vast majority (i.e., 284, 66.2%) were enrolled in business and management-associated courses, while the remaining 145 (i.e., 33.80%) were enrolled in entrepreneurship-related specialised courses. For short demographic information, please follow Table 2.

Table 2 Demographic information and experience of respondent.
Full size table

Statistical descriptions

The following section will investigate the many descriptive statistics indicators the suggested study model’s constructions utilise. The results of this study’s model are presented in Table 3, along with Cronbach’s alpha, mean, average variance extracted standard deviation, composite reliability, and values for each construct. On a Likert scale ranging from one to seven, the fact that the mean value for any given construction is more than five suggests that respondents provided favourable feedback about the construct-related questions. The relatively lower values for a standard deviation for items and aggregated constructs around an average of 1.25 also show that responses did not vary much while responding to questions concerning these constructs. This is implied by the fact that the values for the standard deviation were relatively close together. The majority of them were found to have concurrent characteristics. To determine all nine consistent components, Cronbach’s alpha was applied to the data. According to Podsakoff et al. (2012), using these figures allowed for an evaluation of the dependability of a scale, which indicates the inner coherence of assessing the same notion. It was discovered that the alpha values for all of these constructs were higher than the minimum criterion of 0.70, indicating that the internal consistency of measuring all items for each construct was adequate (Hair et al., 2010; Kock et al., 2021). These findings can be seen in Table 3 down below.

Table 3 Descriptive statistics.
Full size table

Data analysis and result

The results are given through data analysis using AMOS 25.0, first assessing common method bias and normality, then assessing the model’s performance using the confirmatory factor analysis (also called measurement model) and structural equation model.

Common method bias and assessment of normality

Kurtosis values and Skewness were all found within the range of 2 for each, which is a permitted measurement item of all the constructs, confirming the normal distribution of the data utilised for analysis. Standard method bias can occur when the exact response mechanism collects data for dependent and independent variables (Fornell & Larcker, 1981; Anderson & Gerbing, 1988). This is due to collecting data from the same respondent group for dependent independent variables. It is fair to analyse its bias using the standard method bias approach (Neumeyer et al., 2019; Henseler et al., 2015). We employed Harman’s single-factor test to address this issue. Common method bias may appear in data if all critical constructs in one component account for more than 50% of the variance. The loading of all potential elements on a single-factor resulted in an overall variance of 29.34%, which is less than the 50% mark projected. As a result, the instrument revealed no bias indicators in the dataset.

Measurement model

Confirmatory factor analysis or measurement model tests the scales’ discriminant and convergent validity (CFA). The CFA demonstrates that all of the selected items loaded favourably (i.e., factor loading values for all constituent construct items were found to be greater than the minimum threshold value of 0.50) on relevant constructs, giving conclusive empirical evidence of their validity. Cronbach’s alpha and the average extracted (AVE) values assess the variation, and the factor loadings explain on their unpredictable (random) measurement errors (Henseler et al., 2015) and (Bagozzi, Yi, 1988) were discovered to be in the range of 0.540–0.845, and substantially more significant than expected. An appropriate range of validity for all constructs included in data analysis is indicated by an AVE estimate of 0.50. Similarly, the extracted average variance (AVE) values assess the variation explained by the latent variables on their random measurement errors via the proposed study model. For coding and Discriminant validity, please see Table 4.

Table 4 Coding of items taken of CFA and discriminant validity and convergent validity.
Full size table

Table 4 shows the procedures for establishing discriminant validity in which fidelity level (FL) and critical ratio (CR) along with AVEs has been given, as described by (Chin & Todd, 1995). The standard value of AVEs is .50.Potential constructions’ correlation values, which are included across the diagonals of the correlation table (see Table 4), need to be lower than the square root of their AVEs to meet the criteria for discriminant validity. Table 4 shows the results of a discriminant validity analysis, which shows that no two constructs correlated more significantly than the bolded square root of the AVEs. Table 3 shows a significant relationship between mindset and entrepreneurial actions (r = 0.723). This is less than the square root of the AVEs for AT and EB (respectively, 0.806 and 0.888). Table 5 shows that all of the pairs of variables have passed this test. Hence the discriminant validity requirements for all of the scales have been satisfied.

Table 5 Value of discriminant validity.
Full size table

The criterion has recently been criticised for failing to reliably identify the lack of discriminant validity in frequent research contexts (Browne & Cudeck, 1993). Based on this criticism, the authors proposed an alternative methodology based on a multi-training multi-method matrix to investigate the Heterotrait-Monotrait (HTMT) correlation ratio, also famous for the name of discriminant validity. Roy et al. (2017) went on to demonstrate the superior performance of this strategy. Table 4 displays the results of our investigation into the discriminant validity of the various elements using our novel HTMT method. Tripathi & Singh (2017) and Roay et al. (2017) both state that there is a concern with discriminant validity if the HTMT value is more than 0.85 (as criteria) or 0.90 (as a statistical test). Table 6 below displays HTMT or discriminant validity values; none fall outside that range. Therefore, it proves the discriminant validity of all constructs.

Table 6 Discriminant validity.
Full size table

The approximation error is typically quantified using (RMSEA). Critical fit indices (degree of freedom and Chi-square/(DF/2)), adjusted goodness of fit index (AGFI), the goodness of fit index (GFI), and comparative fit index (CFI) were used to assess the model’s ability to explain the data. The CFI is considered because it has the highest index fit (Anderson & Gerbing, 1988), as in Table 7. RMSEA analyses the differences between the degrees of freedom. The critical value of AGFI is 0.82, while the critical value of CFI is 0.89 (Chin & Todd, 1995). For the same reason, the root means square error of approximation (RMSEA) value of 0.06 or below matches the observed data and the postulated model (Browne & Cudeck, 1993). Table 6 displays the fit indices for the measurement model, all of which are acceptable (i.e., GFI = 0.9362/DF = 1.49, AGFI = 0.847, CFI = 0.956, RMSEA = 0.035) (Basaffar et al., 2018).

Table 7 Model fit statistics for the measurement model.
Full size table

Structural model

The confirmation of the structural model’s and measurement model performance is evaluated in the following paragraph. The structural model’s fit indices are supplied for this purpose. Table 7 summarises the structural model’s important fit indices. For instance, along with a p-value less than 0.001, the Chi-square by degree of freedom (2/DF) value was determined to be 1652.357/864 = 1.912. This is because the 2/DF value is good within the [1–3] range suggested by Chin & Todd (1995).

Furthermore, other fit indices, such as the AGFI, GFI, and CFI, were discovered to be 0.912, 0.815, and 0.939, respectively. These numbers were likewise discovered to be significantly higher than the projected ideal threshold values (Chin & Todd, 1995). Finally, with a 0.036 value, the root means square error of approximation (RMSEA) is lower than the suggested value of 0.06. These fit index values show that the proposed structural model described in Table 8 correctly fits the data.

Table 8 For the structural model (SM), the model fit summary.
Full size table

Table 8 has been used to validate the proposed model. Table 8 shows eight direct correlations between nine constructs, all of which were shown to be significant at varying levels of p at 0.05, 0.01, and 0.001. The path coefficient values of the paths influencing entrepreneurial intention included achievability’s indirect repercussions (AF) (=0.161, p = 0.010), anticipated inclination (AI) (=0.271, p = 0.001), entrepreneurial attitude (EAT) (b = 0.272, p < 0.001) and subjective norm (SN) (b = 0.14, p = 0.011), whereas Innovativeness and digitalization (ID) (b = 0.161, p = 0.005), Anticipated social support (ASS) (b = 0.245, p < 0.001), Anticipated control behavior (ACB) (b = 0.224, p < 0.001), as well as Entreprenurial inclination (EI) (b = 0.436, p < 0.001) on Entreprenurial behaviour (EB) was found significant. For path coefficient and hypothesis testing, please see Table 9.

Table 9 Path coefficients and hypothesis testing.
Full size table

Validated research model

In Fig. 2, there is no substitute model validated by the empirical studies or originating studies on people’s intention to start a business that can compare to the 74% variance reported by the research model. (Armuña et al., 2020). The model showed a reasonable variance of 46% and that predicted behavioural controls affect innovation, entrepreneurial behaviour, entrepreneurial intention and anticipated social support. The model explained relatively higher variances in entrepreneurial intention and entrepreneurial behaviour for the dataset, suggesting that it is a better alternative to TPB, EEM, and integrated TPB-EEM models for assessing female entrepreneurs’ intentions and behaviours. Achievability’s indirect repercussions (AF) (=0.042, p = 0.005), anticipated inclination (AI) (=0.070, p = 0.001), entrepreneurial attitude (EAT) (=0.071, p = 0.004), and subjective norm (SN) (=0.040, p = 0.023) on entrepreneurial behaviour were also found to be significant, indicating that all of these antecedents have significant indirect effects on entrepreneurial behaviour.

Fig. 2: Validated research model.
Fig. 2: Validated research model.
Full size image

Figure 2 represents the validated research model for testing of hypothesis. This model has described the higher variance in entrepreneurial behaviours and entrepreneurial intentions. Value of each variable that affects entrepreneurial behaviour and entrepreneurial intentions. Anticipated feasibility indirect repercussions (AF) (=0.042, p = 0.005), anticipated inclination (AI) (=0.070, p = 0.001), entrepreneurial attitude (EAT) (=0.071, p = 0.004), and subjective norm (SN) (=0.040, p = 0.023) on entrepreneurial behaviour were also found to be significant, indicating that all of these antecedents have significant indirect effects on entrepreneurial behaviour.

Discussion

This study constructed a comprehensive TPB-EEM-based extended model. The proposed model not only strikes a middle ground between TPB and EEM, but also includes relevant constructs like innovativeness and digitalisation and anticipated social support to create a novel and straightforward method. It emphasises evaluating the entrepreneurial intentions and actions of Indian female craft entrepreneurs (Kumar et al., 2022; Esfandiar et al., 2019; Fini et al., 2012). Female students at India’s premier public university, the National Institute of Importance, Alomar (2023), found support for the direct linkages postulated in the proposed model. This study investigates how entrepreneurial intents, subjective norms, and attitudes can stimulate further entrepreneurial endeavours. This research did not provide support for the notion that individual values and beliefs have a favourable effect on entrepreneurial goals and subsequent actions. The most significant effect of handicraft entrepreneurs’ mindsets on their business plans is positive in nature and direction. However, neither objective nor subjective norms were significant predictors of entrepreneurial intent.

Four hypothesised factors (attitude, subjective norm, anticipated practicality, and anticipated inclination) were found to influence female students’ intentions to establish a business in the validated research model. In contrast, the hypothesised and supported influence of the other four antecedents on entrepreneurial intentions were anticipated behavioural control, innovativeness and digitalisation, anticipated social support, and entrepreneurial ambition (Ayinaddis, 2023; Alomar, 2023). Previous studies have found an association between individuals’ subjective norms, attitudes, and intentions regarding entrepreneurship and the likelihood that they will engage in social entrepreneurship. The current study demonstrated only a robust positive association between attitudes and expected propensity to establish a handicraft business, contrasting the authors’ conclusions. Different cultural contexts may account for the divergent findings, as may the fact that the current study specifically focussed on students already engaged in entrepreneurial activity, as opposed to the previous studies, which did not undertake the case as discussed. The participants in the studies by Fenech et al. (2019); Utami (2017); Vinothkumar, Subramanian (2016); Yap et al. (2013) were not business owners, but they were professionals and students. This is why more studies must be conducted on people already taking the entrepreneurial plunge. The findings of this study could be viewed as evidence that various factors influence the aspirations of budding and established business owners. A larger-scale, comparative investigation is needed to further investigate this interpretation. While factors like self-efficacy and subjective norms have been shown to have a favourable effect on aspiring entrepreneurs in the early phases of the entrepreneurial process (Amofah & Saladrigues, 2022; Alene, 2020; Cavazos-Arroyo et al., 2017), attitudes may play a more pivotal role later on.

Similarly, Yap et al. (2013), who adapts the Fishbein-Ajzen model, find that entrepreneurial attitudes significantly impact intention within the Theory of Planned Behaviour. Authors argue that attitude formation and change are essential subjects in economics, marketing, and social psychology. According to Yap et al. (2013), one’s attitude determines future actions.

Even though many other studies by Hyland-Wood et al. (2021), Kamberidou (2020) have been conducted to comprehend people’s entrepreneurial intention and behaviour when authors applied the fundamental models of TPB, EEM, and their combination, as well as their further extensions to different situations and relevant factors, to our knowledge, no other study has ever explicitly focused on the female entrepreneur.

Hypothesis H1 was supported (=0.163, p = 0.010), suggesting that students’ expectations of the business’s feasibility significantly impact whether or not they choose to launch a start-up. As this study shows, female students who believe in their ability to become entrepreneurs are more likely to have optimistic expectations about the likelihood of their venture’s success. They can think for themselves about starting a business because of the Education and experience they have gained. Previous studies have also indicated a correlation between a high feasibility level and substantial business potential. The majority of Indian and Arabian women still lack self-confidence. They have not even considered how successful they will become by taking root of building their careers by starting their businesses, even if their financial ability is vital. This suggests that despite a weaker significance level on the anticipated feasibility of entrepreneurial intention, Indian and Arabian women face various restrictions deeply ingrained in their culture.

Similarly, Hypothesis H2 (=0.271, p = 0.001) was significant, implying a positive association between anticipated and entrepreneurial inclination. This substantially higher route coefficient suggests that female students’ desire to start a new firm led to positive intent. This appears self-evident since the increased inclination gives them the desire to overcome obstacles to design successful solutions. The fact that attitude substantially impacts entrepreneurial intention (H3: =0.272, p = 0.001) demonstrates that attitude influences their plans to start a firm. Higher entrepreneurship education may also contribute to female students’ improved attitudes. Given the higher risks of beginning a business, female students’ optimism may inspire them to launch new ventures (Bullough et al., 2022). Similarly, Hypothesis H4 (=0.154, p = 0.012) was significant, indicating a positive association between subjective norm and entrepreneurial inclination.

The relevance of this link implies that family, relatives, and friends influence female students’ intentions to start their enterprises and so on. In other words, the positive impression of the reference group may encourage female students to start a business (Wu et al., 2019).

It appears that young female college students’ motivation to invest time, money, and effort into starting a new business is significantly influenced by innovativeness and digitalisation (i.e., Hypothesis H5: =0.158, p = 0.005). Female students’ innovative ideas for starting businesses will directly influence how they want to run their businesses, suggesting that innovativeness significantly influences entrepreneurial behaviour among college students. Female students may need a lot of social support to choose to engage in certain conduct, as expected social support has a significant impact (=0.245, p = 0.001) on entrepreneurial behaviour (Hypothesis H6). Consistent with earlier research, we find that the expectancy of behavioural control significantly impacts entrepreneurial behaviour (=0.224, p = 0.001). It seems that having a positive attitude toward beginning a business and a solid understanding of ABC are necessary for success. Finally, the entrepreneurial intention has a significant effect on female students’ actions (=0.436, p = 0.001), revealing whether or not they are serious, determined, and have a firm intention to start a business, which will translate into a substantial commitment to investing money, time, and effort to make it successful.

Implications and limitations

This section comprises theoretical contribution, research implication, and limitations and future scope of research.

Theoretical contribution

This study has made numerous theoretical advances while working on this research to understand the elements influencing and enhancing the capacity of female craft entrepreneurs’ goals and behaviour in India. First, despite women being at the forefront of economic development in emerging nations and Southeast Asian countries, there have been few empirical studies on female entrepreneurship in general and in India (Yadav et al., 2022a). As a result, the endeavour to conduct this type of empirical research in the setting of India with Gulf countries is an important contribution to the literature on handicraft entrepreneurship. Second, to our knowledge, this is the first comprehensive literature review of its kind, evaluating all previous studies on female entrepreneurship to ascertain the field’s current state and identify areas where more investigation is needed. Third, the proposed model for this research provides a unique and novel amalgamation of the TPB and the EEM’s core constructs and incorporates external constructs such as innovativeness, digital entrepreneurship, and anticipated social support. The previous research proposed in the handmade items set a new variety of research models primarily based on the TPB, the EEM, or a combination of both. It has far-reaching effects on how women in India’s craft industry forge their paths and form their opinions as business owners. Finally, the model’s balance and parsimony are demonstrated by the fact that 74% and 46% of the variances in entrepreneurial intention and behaviour are explained, respectively (Amofah & Saladrigues, 2022).

Implications of the research

This study will support the different researchers to do new innovative research in small industries and the handicraft sector and should focus on geographical research. Because environmental condition from place to place is different, researchers and other related organisations involved in research will explore their ideas from learning this study to develop a new concept.

Managerial and policy implication

This study’s findings will also support organisation managers who decide on the organisation’s development and set up new entrepreneurial businesses. This will also motivate familiar people to open start-ups for handicraft products. This will also support the government and policymakers prepare policies according to the market’s demand. It will augment Policymakers with crucial narratives to move beyond measures to solve some fundamental issues of handmade female entrepreneurship in India. To encourage women to take the entrepreneurial root and start their businesses rather than relying on government jobs, the government could promote hands-on instruction in some professional courses on small and unorganised businesses and entrepreneurship. This relatively decisive factor enhances and affects attitudes on handicraft entrepreneurial intention and behaviours. As a result, the government can provide more and better opportunities for female students, while the small-scale industries and private sectors can hire fewer people overall. We suggest colleges and universities should do more to prepare their students for the real-world by including lectures from successful business people and industry leaders in their curricula.

Social and financial implications

A significant influence of subjective norms on handicraft entrepreneurial intention suggests that female students need to be motivated personally by their family, neighbours, co-workers, and friends. This will motivate the local, rural and semi-skilled people to do their businesses, provide local job opportunities, reform the financial condition of their families, and increase India’s GDP. In contrast, positive word-of-mouth from a successful female entrepreneur in the region can also significantly boost female students’ capabilities, skills, digital technological awareness, knowledge, and confidence. It could show them how to start their own handmade business.

Similarly, the positive impact of ABC on entrepreneurial activity in the handicraft industry implies that governments and policymakers should consider providing appropriate monetary assistance. This assistance may be in the form of subsidies, easy loans for women owners, places for trade fairs (Hunnar hat, saras fair, craft fairs, craft Hackathon) and open common facility centres, handicraft parks, handicraft museums, handicraft design bank, unique TV channel for craft promotions, to inspire business owners. As part of the initiative, the government may provide internships to female students in various fields (including business, Education, healthcare, and others) to help them gain experience and confidence in leveraging their skills to create new opportunities. Expected inclination has a moderate and positive effect on entrepreneurial intention, suggesting that female students’ interest in starting a business could be sustained if educational institutions provided some of the most appealing and practical programmes on business and entrepreneurship to students. These programmes could include seminars and practical exercises to help alleviate students’ reluctance to consider entrepreneurship.

Limitations and future scope of research

Like other research, this one has some caveats. The first part of this research looks at how specific factors affect the aspirations and actions of female handicraft entrepreneurs. Further caution is warranted when extrapolating this study’s results to predominantly male or female populations. Secondly, information for this study was collected from female students at several Indian universities using a convenience sample. To better understand the perspective of female students taking a variety of business courses at varying levels, future research could collect data from students at universities outside the country to establish a representative sample. Finally, this research uses a cross-sectional design to gather information. It would be interesting to see if students’ interest in entrepreneurship shifts between the time they begin their professional Education and the time they are about to graduate. Finally, the proposed research model in this study did not incorporate any moderating variables. Some of these associations may be examined in greater depth in future studies by controlling for factors including entrepreneurial Education, entrepreneurial competence, and previous entrepreneurial experience.

Conclusions

This study aspires to deepen our knowledge of the factors that motivate and inspire Indian college women and some working women to launch their businesses. Based on the theoretical foundations of two basic models (TPB and EEM), this study proposed and validated a research model using data collected from Indian universities. In addition to the TPB-EEM-based integrated model, two different characteristics were used: creativity and expected social support. Eight hypotheses were generated, all statistically significant regarding entrepreneurial goals and craft-related behaviour. This paper draws several theoretical and practical implications from the research, including novel and valuable additions to the existing knowledge on entrepreneurship, particularly in the handicraft sector. Implications for educational institutions; improved education programmes; and targeted support for women pursuing business and professional Education or recently graduated from university. Indian market is based on traditional demand and production routes, especially in the handicraft industry. So the attitude of customers and products vary because consumers purchase the products they see on TV and social media. The entrepreneurial intention is to change the criteria of making products according to the demand for craft product, which competes with machine-made products. Entrepreneurial behaviour is just like intention, and innovativeness attracts women entrepreneurs to demand total products. Finally, it has been seen that some factors affect female entrepreneurship behaviour in the handicraft industry.

Behaviour, attitude, and intention are factors affecting female entrepreneurship. We can see that Indian female students and professionals pursuing their degrees in different reputed institutions are attracted to do business. This study can allow researchers, policymakers and NGOs to motivate women in the handicraft industry. This industry has the potential to give employment to local people. The local job seekers can earn a livelihood by working in craft organisations. By having financial stability, they may become firm, and females can be better promoters of craft products at the global level. Their entrepreneurial intention may increase the working capacity of much weaker section and tribal ladies. This may transform the craft industry into a big-basket consortium. They can compete well with machine-made products, thus helping the nation’s economy and increasing employment opportunities through this industry.