The antecedents of entrepreneurial behaviour in the creation of platform economy initiatives: An analysis based on the decomposed theory of planned behaviour

Abstract

The platform economy (PE) has experienced its strongest period of growth since the emergence of the sharing economy (SE). Much work has been put into understanding the effects and antecedents of the PE, with particular emphasis on peers and consumer motivation, yet few studies have analysed the motivations of the service providers and even fewer its impact on individual and collective wellbeing. The aim of this paper is provide a better understanding of the decomposed beliefs that inform the attitudinal, social-normative and control factors that make up pro-PE behavioural intention (the intention to develop a PE initiative) in the context of digitisation and wellbeing, while making the platform the focus of analysis. In this study we adapt and extend the Decomposed Theory of Planned Behaviour (DTPB) and use partial least squares regression (PLS), a structural equation modelling technique, to analyse valid data collected from 127 PE organisations operating in Spain. The empirical results obtained demonstrate that the three antecedents for behavioural intention (perceived control, attitude and the subjective norm) have a positive effect on the intention to develop a PE initiative. The study also shows that PE micro-entrepreneurs are motivated by individual and collective wellbeing and not just financial gain. This contributes substantially to reconciling the PE with its origins, rooted in pro-solidarity and social concerns, and to framing wellbeing in a broader paradigm consisting of psychological and social factors, going beyond the economic considerations and interests contained in previous paradigms.