Emotional Consciousness for Entrepreneurial Learning

Entrepreneurship education in Latin America increasingly unfolds in contexts marked by economic volatility, institutional fragility, and relational interdependence, intensifying the emotional demands placed on students. While emotional intelligence has been widely studied as an individual competency, less attention has been given to how emotional processes develop within venture-based curricula in the region. This study advances the concept of emotional consciousness as a developmental capability emerging from the integration of cognitive and somatic processes and asks how it contributes to entrepreneurial learning in Latin American higher education. The Emotional Consciousness for Entrepreneurship (ECE) program was implemented across six Mexican campuses using a convergent mixed-methods design combining qualitative interviews ( n = 32) with pre–post survey measures ( n = 97), integrated through abductive analysis. Qualitative findings reveal a layered developmental process in which somatic regulation enables cognitive-emotional differentiation, which in turn supports identity reinterpretation and relational leadership enactment. Quantitative indicators remained largely stable, a divergence we theorize as evidence that standardized trait instruments under-detect early-stage developmental change. Findings position emotional consciousness as a foundational regulatory capability shaping entrepreneurial learning under uncertainty and contribute a contextually grounded model of emotional consciousness development for entrepreneurship education in Latin America.