Studying the Role of Social Capital in Increasing the Potential of Entrepreneurship (Case Study: the University of Tabriz Students)

Entrepreneurship is one of the influential factors in social sustainable development. Since that through a focus on the creative characteristics of the entrepreneurs, we can prepare the necessary bese for their growth and development. The aim of this paper is to assess the effect of social capital and its dimensions on the potential of entrepreneurship among the students. To do this, the main hypothesis is defined as a significant relationship between the social capital and its dimensions with the entrepreneurship potential. The target population includes the whole students in University of Tabriz in 2013-2014 from whom 404 were chosen using random stratified sampling method. To analyze the data, the Pearson correlation test and regression analysis were used. The results show that there is a significant relationship between the social capital and its dimensions with the entrepreneurship potential. That is, with an increase in social capital, the level of entrepreneurship potential will increase. The findings also show that the mean of students in entrepreneurship potential is more than the average and it was average for social capital. Pragmatism among the dimensions of entrepreneurship and social norm among the dimensions of social capital had the highest mean. According to the results of research, entrepreneurship potential has mainly affected by the social norm. Then social trust and social networks had the main role in explaining the changes of dependent variable.