Journal of Iranian Social Studies

Abstract In Iran, like other countries, there are a small number of people who are not satisfied with their sex, and do attempt to change it. Although the Iranian legal system has legitimized sex rearrangement conditionally, transsexual people encounter many limitations during the process of sex change and even later in their personal and social life. Thus, such situation decreases their stock of social capital and the level of life quality. This paper is based on Lin’s approach that considers the quality of life as a kind social capital return. Firstly, the amount of transsexuals’ social capital and their quality of life is described. Then, the relation between social capital and quality of life is analyzed in accordance with Lin’s approach. The data was gathered via survey method and interviewing 168 persons who were under supervision of Welfare centers across the country. The results indicate that the mean figures for social capital and quality of life among respondents are lower than the expected statistical mean. Therefore, there is a significant and direct relationship between these two variables. Any decrease in transsexuals’ social capital leads to weakness of their social capital return especially in the aspect of expression.

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Abstract Covid-19 pandemic has imposed restrictions which have had unintended consequences for women and have increased domestic violence against women due to the long-term quarantine. In this regard, the present study aimed to provide sociological insight into the consequences of covid-19 pandemic and the escalation of violence against women by qualitative method and in-depth semi-structured interviews with 15 women in Rasht city. Data were extracted using the thematic analysis technique. The results show that the covid-19 pandemic causes the aggravation of verbal disputes between couples, reproduction of stereotypes, the continuation of the cycle of domestic violence, intensified fear of disease and increased responsibilities of women. Furthermore, quarantine had intensified the despair and depression of women and led to the reproduction of the cycle of violence.

Abstract Covid-19 has become a nasty pandemic whose effects have been recognized to the point of collective trauma. Measures and protocols to deal with this pandemic have almost as many consequences as the disease itself, and the home and family as the safest and, of course, the most important center for combating the disease have become very important due to the intensification of measures such as social distancing and quarantine. And of course, at the same time, it has faced serious dangers from violence to separation and educational crisis, and so on.
The present article has performed a qualitative analysis to identify family relationships and hazards in Kurdistan during this crisis. The method of the present study has been expensive theory and a sample of key experts and informants that has continued to the point of saturation of interviews.
The results of the study indicate that returning home and staying in it to deal with Corona has caused the importance of mother and wife in family relationships, but this importance does not really mean secrecy and sorrow and rather has been painful and painful. The results also indicate the prominence of categories such as social subordination, family atomization, educational and leisure crisis and such cases as central categories.

Abstract he formative period of Alatas’ thought was that of colonialism, particularly in British Malaya and the Netherlands East Indies. While a student at the University of Amsterdam in the 1950s, he wrote his first piece on the problems of colonialism. Here, he divided the problems created by colonialism into three categories. The third category is the non-material, that is, the sociological, psychological and moral problems created by colonialism. Alatas believed that the greatest damage that colonialism brought about was in this third area and it was this problem that hampered the solution to many societal problems. It was also during this time that Alatas attached a great deal of importance to the nature of the elite in development. He suggested that the ruling elite which was nurtured in the colonial period lacked a well-integrated system of thought, having been unable to bring about a synthesis between their cultural heritage and Western thought. This chapter described Alatas’ decolonial perspective in terms of his theory, method and context.

Abstract Becoming interdisciplinary is a growing tendencyprominent in different areas of knowledge which are either inter-related or closely tied with one another. Nonetheless, there are considerable theoretical and practical disagreements on the precise meaning of ‘interdisciplinary’. At the same time one is faced with important reasons for paying attention to an interdisciplinary approach. In Iran, focusing on sociology, we can discuss important questions on the role of interdisciplinary tendency and its difficulties in sociology. Therefore, I intend to portray a picture of possibilities, obstacles and dysfunctions in doing interdisciplinary within sociology in Iran, given the status of the Iranian sociology in particular, and the status of social sciences, in general.It is in this respect that some questions are asked and certain suggestions are offered here. The aim of this paper is to discuss and examine necessities and consequences in relation to the efforts made toward creation of an atmosphere conducive to interdisciplinary work in sociology in Iran, and to determine the results gained from such attempts so far. For studying the basic questions of this paper, the documentary method was used. The paper initially presents a description as to the formation of interdisciplinary studies in Iran and then proceeds to follow sociology’s path with regard to interdisciplinary tendency. The results of this study show that the efforts put into making instances of instruction and research can overcome some tangible shortcomings as seen in social studies, organize a promising research program, and may help to bring about a systematic project for dealing with social problems. Having noticed the above, however, a reminder is in order to the effect that the interdisciplinary work is faced with many conceptual (methodological, and theoretical) and practical difficulties deriving from the characteristic features of the academic community, social system, and the life-world. The final section of this paper, emphasizing the salient issue proposes that theinterdisciplinaryapproach can be used toward the end of reaching a solution for the problematic of social sciences in Iran. Yet, simultaneously, we are faced with different theoretical and practical problems. Then, the road of research on the connections between interdisciplinary method and social research is fraught with ambiguities .The scientific society of sociology should be attentive to these problems and ought to try to resolve them through the dialogue.

Abstract The end of the cold war witnessed the retreat of socialism from the bourgeois system followed by the failure of modernization process among the Islamic countries. This laid the groundwork for developing an ideological and political thought known as Resistance Islam. This process, regardless of geographical borders, became a worldwide phenomenon, although it has been more effective in some regions because of their political and religious conditions. The region encompassing Kurd people in Iraq and Iran (after the coalition forces attacked Iraq in 2003) consists of areas that accepted this social and rational process under the rubric of Salafism. This article seeks, both, to introduce the above process and its internal divisions and to answer the question why Salafism was converted into an identity origin for some Sunni Kurds of Iran. The article collected the required information in semantics, ideological system and the social thoughts of Iran's Salafist Kurds by conducting a case-study method, combined with an observation technique accompanied by the interview, theoretical and content codification among the target population. The results of this article would represent that the Salafist idea is formed around some concepts such as monotheism, excommunication, Jihad, Idolater, idealism, religion inclusion and the like. The structure and the organization of Iran's Salafist Kurds can be categorized in four groups of Radical Jihadist, Middle Jihadist, Traditional Non-jihadist and Conservative Non-jihadist.  Finally, the obtained information is indicative of the fact that it appears that Salafism by placing an emphasis on protest concept, objecting the present situation, compliance with an ideal past of Islam and by fundamentalism and by the label of extremism constitute a kind of resistance identity which is based on the conception of religious inclusion against the dominant and secular discourse of the Kurd, and thereby exhibits these characteristics for others to notice.

Abstract Family is a primary context which is fundamental in human development. It plays an important role in developing the sense of security. The aim of this study is to determine effective socio-cultural factors related to the sense of security in the family. This study has been conducted using a survey method. Data has been gathered thorough questionnaire. The sample of study constitutes 500 families of Shiraz city. The reliability of questionnaire was confirmed via Chronbach's alpha. The results of study show that the relationship between sense of security in the family, with religiosity, life satisfaction, living facilities, social deviance, social relationships, parental education and family income is significant. Multivariate regression results suggest that life satisfaction and social deviance are the most important predictors of feeling of security amongst people studied hereby.

Abstract The article is the result of a survey conducted on the role of interpersonal communication in political participation. It compares the effects of interpersonal communication and media on decisions of Tehran citizens in 10th parliamentary election of Iran. The study is based on Lazarsfeld's theory of two-step flow of communication which was completed by Robinson. According to Robinson, community is divided at least into three sections; leaders, followers and inactive people. The spread of information by the media can affect all sectors of society. An information and influence flow from leaders to followers. The study is a survey one with a sample of 840 individuals. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire one week after 9th parliamentary election of Iran from residents of 22 districts of the Tehran city. The results show that "interpersonal communications" were stronger and more effective in comparison to the "mass media" in 2013 Iranian parliamentary election. According to the results of study political behavior of citizens could be categorized into five categories including passive, follower, leader, individualist, and dialectic based on their interpersonal communications. Furthermore, political participation, media consumption and sources of news and engagement of each group was investigated.

Abstract Historically, mystical and Sufistic Islam have been the hegemonic and institutionalized religious attitude in Kurdistan. Despite some discrepancies among different branches of Sufism, in their rituals and hierarchical systems, there is a fundamental distinction between them and Sharia or Jurisprudence based branches of Islam. Among the various mystical schools, tariqas (ways) of "Qadiri" and "Naqshbandi" have gained the highest social status among Sunni Kurds and expanded their sphere of influence throughout Kurdistan. Various factors such as the occurrence of Shiite Islamic revolution in Iran, the emergence of Shiite ideology, the rise of the various types of Sunni fundamentalist ideologies and flaring competition between them in the Islamic nations, made a substantial impact on religious attitudes all over Muslim communities as well as Kurdistan. In addition, financial aids, educational, and sometimes logistical supports of Arabic and Islamic countries to followers in Kurdistan, and also the existence of internal political, social and economic condition have provided an appropriate basis for growth and development of these Pan-Islamic movements in Kurdistan.  Relying on historical sources, media and field evidences, and international published statistics, this research investigates the emergence and growth of Salafi thoughts among the Sunni Kurds of Iran in a documentary method of research. It seems that changes are taking place faster than what supposed to be, and Kurdistan, like other Middle Eastern Sunni countries, is not immune from flaming waves of fundamentalism.     

Abstract The main purpose of this research was to investigate students’ social networking in learning-innovation process. This research was carried out using qualitative exploratory approach through the method of grounded theory (systematic method, Strauss & Corbin). The purposeful sampling of study included 47 students from Shahid Beheshti University, Sharif University of Technology, and University of Tehran. The collected data were analyzed via coding procedures (open, axial & selective coding). The results of student’s learning-innovation network model indicate that “management of learning system” is regarded as the core category of student’s social networking. Therefore, the learning system develops interpersonal networks of students. Thus, there is a wide range of consciously and multi-dimensional social participation and social wandering in context of education, which ultimately leads to a variety of consequences from innovation to academic burnout.    

Abstract The topic of this article is child adoption of people who have spinal cord injury caused by Iran-Iraq war. Since most disabled war casualties who have spinal cord injury cannot have biological children, child adoption is a substitution. A large number of war casualties in Iran, due to their psychological as well as physical status have adopted children. The study aimed at answering the following questions; how do these people narrate their situation with child adoption and the way they face it? What difficulties or challenges have they been facing? The study is based on grounded theory methodology. The subjects of study include 20 disabled war casualties who have spinal cord injury (waist and neck) in three cities: Tehran, Qom and Isfahan. The findings explain that child adoption has been a way to confront with problems of loneliness, family disagreements and emotional issues. However, over time as the child grows to the maturity, especially at high school and later on, family face multiple problems. Keeping the child adoption as “the big secret”, being a confidant or not a confidant, attitudes of relatives and friends, being an only child, legal obstacles, common problems and social rejection can be considered as some of the problems of child adoption in such families.

Abstract The function and historical role of the rural community is more extensive than agricultural culture and the supplying surplus production and manpower to urban, industrial, artistic and commercial sectors.  In the field of agriculture, the processes of Intensification cultivation and discoveries and inventions associated with them have an effect on the valuable nature of the rural community.  This research was carried out using documentary and survey sources. Of the nearly 3,000 books and scientific and research reports, three hundred sources have been reviewed and categorized with the help of M.A students of rural development. The author used survey data and sample statistics for analysis of rural and agricultural indicators. The results indicate that during the first decade after the victory of the Islamic Revolution and due to participatory development, the living standards of many villages increased, child mortality rates went down, and the level of welfare and awareness of the villagers rose, but the sectorization of rural development, has led many development indicators to decline over the past two decades. However, rural communities, have 38.5% of agricultural land, produce more than fifty percent of food products and seventy percent of agricultural products.  Since rural development and agricultural growth are two side of a coin, the simultaneous development of rural and agricultural communities and the reduction of urban marginalization following the realization of the strategic principles of modern protectionism will be a success. Decrease of income and welfare levels among rural communities, which is decrease from 60% in 2012 to 56% in recent years, has led to increase of parasitic situation and deepening of inequalities between rural and urban communities, both led to rise of malnutrition, disease and rapid marginalization. The best way to moderate the marginalization of the text is to return to local communities and create a rural development ministry.

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Abstract The present essay studies the theoretical distinctions of two concepts: that of pilgrimage and that of tour in three aspects of social act, close approximation with different life style and two phenomena of pilgrim and tourist as two discursive identities. The essay makes distinction based on the experiences of three generations of Shahid Beheshti University’s staff. As such it builds a framework and makes efforts to demonstrate experiential distinctions among three generations on pilgrimage-tour. The technique of the depth interview was used to collect data for this study; therefore 15 persons of the university’s staff belonging to three generations were interviewed. The results show a marked reduction in third generation respondents’ tendency to pilgrimage in comparison with second and first generations. Also the respondents subjectively make a conceptual distinction between pilgrimage and tour of sacred places in abroad. This distinction is less frequently seen among pilgrimage and tour inside the country.

Abstract Driving violations amongst motorcycle riders is one of the main problems in traffic. According to studies, the motorcycle riders’ unsafe driving practices have an important role in traffic accidents. Given the theory of planned behavior and normative perspective, this article investigates some of the attitudinal and social factors affecting the motorcyclists’ traffic violations. In this survey, with the use of multistage cluster sampling method, a sample including 473 motorcyclists, above 18 years old, were chosen and interviewed. Findings reveal that variables of attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioral control have significant effects on intentions of the motorcycle riders for traffic violations. The impacts of a behavioral intention, procedural justice and feeling of obligation to obey law on traffic violations, is also significant. In sum, the results of multiple regression analysis indicate that the variables of a behavioral intention and the perceived behavioral control related to theory of planned behavior, and variables of procedural justice and feelings of obligation to obey traffic law related to normative perspective, explain 35 percent of the variance in driving violations of the motorcyclists.

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Abstract Extensive changes in recent decades have affected Iranian universities and due to these changes focusing on cultural programs has increased. Cultural planning requires a comprehensive understanding of the community's values, attitudes, and behaviors, because each cultural policy ultimately needs to be accepted by its target audience. Therefore, identifying the status quo can be considered as a prerequisite for cultural planning. The objectives of this paper are to identify the status quo of Art universities and the students by investigating their cultural traits, and to present suitable strategies for cultural planning. This paper is based on a qualitative research, which was conducted at two universities – Tehran University of Art and Tehran College of Fine Arts. The methods used to collect data, were in-depth unstructured interview and focus group analysis. The most important finding of this research is the significant difference of cultural conditions between art students and students of other majors. This difference should not be treated in a superficial manner. The first step in addressing this differentiation is to discriminate the origins of the differences. The results indicate that some of these differences are related to the nature of art majors, and thus inevitable, while some other differences must be tracked down and taken into account by policy makers.  

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Abstract The phenomenon of domestic violence is considered as the origin of many individual and social harms and it occurs in all developed and developing countries and among all socio-economic, age, and vocational groups. In the current study, using the qualitative approach of grounded theory, husbands' violence against wives was studied based on the viewpoint and life experience of women affected by violence. In order to collect data 35 women who were victims of violence and had referred to the social emergency centers were interviewed. The research findings were classified in 29 primary concepts in open coding, then were classified in eight main categories. The canonical category obtained as "the reflection of socio-cultural structure of the society". The results show that the highest rate of violence has been experienced among women aged 30 to 40 years. Findings of this study show that among types of violence, psycho-emotional and physical violence is more common. The qualitative findings of the current study, while referring to the general elements of husbands' violence against women such as low level of education, unemployment, poverty, and the undesirable economic conditions, also presented some special categories like the existence of patriarchal thoughts, compulsory marriage, the reduction in interpersonal trust, the reduction in social support, experiencing  violence in family of origin, low level of women's authority in the family structure, and the reduction in cooperation in the family.       

Abstract The Present study seeks to investigate the status of street quarrels among citizens of Sanandaj. The study is based on qualitative methodology of grounded theory. Data were collected using semi-structured interviews and participant observation techniques. 15 person with experience of involvement in street quarrels were included in the sample. Comparison Methods of Strauss and Corbin was used to analyze the data. Seven Categories were selected from 64 initial codes and the category of "social deformity /obstruction of communication action" were introduced as the central category. Findings of the research based on interviews with people involved in street quarrels and coding of responses also indicate that three groups of causative, background and interventional factors were identified in the paradigmatic model. The causative factors include the lack of communication skills, the reduction of the threshold of tolerance and financial and family disputes. the underlying factors such as location, socioeconomic status and parenting and education have been the contributing factors. Structural violence and cultural poverty were identified as intervening factors.  The interaction of these factors cause the preparation of conflict grounds, tendency to conflict, and ultimately the occurrence of street quarrel in Sanandaj.

Abstract The present study aims to conceptualize the smoking experience of female college students through a phenomenological approach. The study was conducted based on in-depth and semi-structured interviews with 21 female students of the universities of Kerman. The participants were selected using a purposive sampling method and considering the saturation of information. The data were analyzed and divided into main categories of individual agency, coping, traumatic events, individual's resistance and sub-categories of risk and excitement seeking, response to unequal conditions, the need for acceptance, significant others, heterogeneity of family interactions and lack of resilience. Findings show that smoking is more a response to disordered conditions and is influenced by many social factors such as excitement-seeking, response to unequal conditions, need for acceptance, heterogeneity of family interactions, and lack of resilience.

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to introduce the principles of a synthesis on social science methodology. Such synthesis is based on a reading of methodological approaches of three intellectuals in this area, who are Ludwig Wittgenstein, Friedrich August Hayek, and Hans-Georg Gadamer. In the first part, I explain the necessity of synthesizing social science methodology. Then, upon reviewing the relevant literature, I discuss the principles of two main social science methodological approaches. The third part explains the possibility of synthesis. Such a possibility is discussed through reviewing six main similarities amongthree intellectual’s approaches within the format of finding equivalence for each thinker’s keywords which have been discussed in other thinkers’ language game. Although there are different concepts for each similarity on special intellectual approach, I explain why these different concepts can be translated into each other. These similarities are: the existence of a rulefollowing social context in the backdrop of individual actions, the originality of practical and unconscious activity versus theoretical and conscious activity, metaphoric use of the (language) game in the sense that aspects of the agency is retained within the context of the structure, initiating from a subjective base while reaching an objectivity which lies beyond the individuals, limitation of cognition and rejection of the observer’s stance, and finally, striving to render a criterion in order to avoid relativism. These similarities, at the same time, form the fundamental principles of the suggested synthetic methodology. In the final section of the paper, these similarities are revisited explicitly and also formulated in response to the three main questions of nature of subject matter of the social science, how it is to be studied (the methodological requirements), and the goal of a social science study. It is on such basis that the subject matter of social sciences has been declared, by the synthesis approach, to be the language-historical order, of which the language aspect is based on Wittgenstein’s approach, the historical aspect based on Gadamerapproach, and the order concept is gained from Hayek theories. The final part also expounds the goal of a social science study in that it is the dissection of these orders, in Wittgenstein-Gadamerian sense of the word. Within the environs of such a goal also lie limited provision of predictions based on the dissection of these orders. Thus, based on subject matter and the goal, the methodological requirements of a social science study are put to discussion.

Abstract Oocyte donation forms a part of so called "Assisted Reproduction Technology" (ART) that assists infertile women with ovarian problems or other medical factors to achieve their dream of having a child. Understanding the experience of infertile women in a difficult decision-making period for oocyte donation and selecting it over other alternatives (adoption or to live without children) is significant. Little is known about the lived experience of recipient women though, especially in Iran, due to the cultural, social, and religious conditions of the society. The present article describes the experience of those infertile women. This study was conducted using qualitative method and phenomenological approach with the aim of recognizing and describing the experiences of the women recipients of donated oocyte. Eleven participants were selected by purposive sampling method from women who had turned to Royan Infertility Institute in Tehran, Iran. The data were generated from transcription of taped Semi-structured in-depth interviews. Data analysis was in accordance with the procedure introduced by Colaizzi. Six main themes emerged from the women’s descriptions of their experiences:(1) the possibility of maintaining the confidentiality in egg donation; (2) the opportunity of having the experience of pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding ;(3) the chance of genetic transition from husband ;(4) the impact of time factor in choosing oocyte donation ;(5) oocyte donation being permissible from a religious point of view; and (6) emotional and social burden of infertility.