Shannon Younger is an Assistant Professor of Strategy, Entrepreneurship and Venture Innovation at the Sam M. Walton College of Business, University of Arkansas. She earned her Ph.D. in Management and Human Resources from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and her B.A. in Communication Studies and French from the University of Iowa. Her research examines how entrepreneurial ventures become and remain meaningful in the markets where they compete — specifically, how entrepreneurs use cultural tools like stories, framing, and history to shape audience perceptions and navigate complex environments.

This work unfolds across two interconnected streams. The first explores how entrepreneurs influence audience understanding, investigating how ventures use narratives to achieve legitimate distinctiveness in evolving market categories, how framing tactics generate pre-launch engagement, how online communities co-create meaning in nascent markets, and how new ventures without established histories construct rhetorical ties to the past. The second stream examines how entrepreneurs navigate environmental constraints, including regulatory complexity, market category stagnation, and the psychological challenges of entrepreneurship.

As a qualitative researcher, Shannon builds rich, multi-source datasets — from extensive fieldwork and interviews to archival records, FOIA requests, and website text — to uncover the mechanisms behind these phenomena. Her work has been published in the Journal of Business Venturing, Applied Psychology, and Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research, with papers currently under review at other leading management journals. She serves on the Editorial Advisory Board of the Journal of Business Venturing and reviews for Strategic Management Journal and Academy of Management Review, among others. Her research has been recognized with a Best Paper Award at the Babson College Entrepreneurship Research Conference, and she has presented her work internationally at venues including the Academy of Management, the European Group for Organizational Studies, and the Business History Conference. She has received funding from the University of Arkansas, Tulane University's Albert LePage Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.