A room of her own: does the improvement of gender role attitude promote rural mothers’ entrepreneurship?—Evidence from China

Introduction: How does the change in gender role attitude reshape women's entrepreneurship? This question holds significant practical implications for unleashing women's economic potential and promoting inclusive economic development. Methods: Using data from the Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS), this study analyzes the impact of an improved gender role attitude on rural mothers' entrepreneurship. Results: The results show that the improvement in gender role attitude increases the entrepreneurship rate of rural mothers by 4.89%. However, there are differences. The impact of an improved gender role attitude on rural mothers' necessity-based entrepreneurship is 4% higher than that on opportunity-based entrepreneurship. Specifically, the improvement in gender role attitude has a significant positive effect on the entrepreneurship of rural mothers who have not completed higher education, while it shows the opposite effect on those who have completed higher education. Mechanism analysis reveals that family support and information access play a moderating role in the impact of gender role attitude on rural mothers' entrepreneurship. Discussion: The study also finds that the entrepreneurial behavior of rural mothers has a spillover effect. Rural mothers provide more employment opportunities for other women through their entrepreneurial activities. Not only expands the research boundary of women's entrepreneurship and the application scope of entrepreneurship theories, but also explores the internal mechanism through which gender role attitudes influence rural mothers' entrepreneurship.