ENHANCING HUMAN WELL-BEING THROUGH RESPONSIBLE ENTREPRENEURSHIP: MEDIATING ROLE OF FAMILY CULTURE

Abstract

Well-being has become one of the major aspirations of people worldwide. This concern is reflected in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDGs 3 and 12, as well as in the growing attention given by entrepreneurship scholars to responsible entrepreneurship practices. However, entrepreneurship researchers remain divided on the factors that promote well-being. In addition, Nigeria is a culturally oriented society where food preparation and consumption are strongly shaped by social values, traditions and family practices. In recent times, restaurants in Abuja, Nigeria, have increasingly been associated with the use of unwholesome food ingredients in meal preparation. Against this background, this study investigates the relationships among responsible entrepreneurship, family culture, specifically individualistic and collectivistic cultural orientations, and human well-being. The study adopts a cross-sectional survey design, a criterion sampling technique and a sample frame method to select 279 customers from 174 family-owned standardised restaurants across the six Area Councils of Abuja. The PLS-SEM results reveal that responsible entrepreneurship has positive and significant direct effects on human well-being, individualistic cultural orientation and collectivistic cultural orientation. The results also show that individualistic and collectivistic cultural orientations are positively and significantly related to human well-being. Furthermore, responsible entrepreneurship indirectly influences human well-being through both cultural orientations. The study empirically demonstrates that responsible entrepreneurship is an important determinant of human well-being and that such well-being can be enhanced in a context that encourages ethical individual initiative and collective responsibility.