Does Gender Equality Matter? – Examining Antecedents of Crowdfunding Backers’ Intentions in a Gender Equal Society

Abstract

Despite promises of financial democracy, studies find differences between males and females in both the scale of their crowdfunding backing behavior and the factors impacting it. These are often explained by social feminist theory claiming that gender differences arise from dissimilar life experiences or socialization. In the current study we identify the most pervasive of gender differences and examine whether they apply in a relatively more gender equal society, where dissimilar life experiences or socialization should be minimal. Here, crowdfunding is assumed to remove traditional structural and technical barriers, while gender equality is assumed to remove socio-normative barriers for women’s engagement in venture funding. Accordingly, we test related hypotheses based on survey data collected from users of a reward crowdfunding platform in Finland, a society ranking high on gender equality. For both males and females, findings show that self-efficacy has a positive association with intentions; and that risk perceptions and susceptibility to social influence are not associated with intentions. Homophily is positively associated with intentions in females only, while pro-social orientation is positively associated with intentions in males only. Intentions are positively associated with behavior in both genders, and that effects on behavior mediated by intentions follow the same patterns.