Journal of Iranian Social Studies

Abstract The pervasive use of technology among children and adolescents has made issues related to their digital life a new public concern. This issue has engaged various stakeholders including parents, educators, child rights advocates, technology companies, and policymakers. Each of these stakeholders has its own perspectives and concerns about cyberspace and how to govern it. This study aims at identifying the main stakeholders in the cyberspace policy for children and adolescents as well as to identify the uncertainties that affect policymaking in this area. To this end, the content of 356,210 tweets in the 8 months leading up to August 2023 was analyzed using content analysis and social network analysis methods.
The results show that there are 5 main stakeholder groups in cyberspace for children and adolescents: parents, educators, child rights advocates, technology companies, and policymakers. These stakeholders engage in dialogue with each other on 6 main topics: access to educational resources, global communication, creativity and self-expression, digital literacy and skills, cyberbullying and harassment, privacy risks, and digital addiction and mental health.
This study identified three pairs of influential policy uncertainties, each of which was favored by one or more stakeholder groups: the uncertainty of global governance advocates versus local governance advocates, the uncertainty of open access to information advocates versus information security advocates, and the uncertainty of free market advocates versus government intervention advocates. The diversity of stakeholders and their views on cyberspace is a major challenge for policymakers. Policymakers must seek ways to balance the interests and concerns of different stakeholders while taking this diversity into account.
 

Abstract The main stream of researches that tried to explain the unfavorable situation of sociology in Iran have pointed to the weakness of scientific communication between researchers and in one word, the weakness of the scientific community as the main factor of the unfavorable situation of sociology in Iran. While these researches have completely ignored one of the most frequent scientific communications among researchers in this field, i.e. the links formed through participation in the refereeing teams of theses. The current research has sought to describe and explain the network of links of these arbitration teams. For this purpose, the dissertations presented in the sociology departments of Tehran, Tarbiat Modares, Allameh Tabatabai, Shahid Beheshti and Alzahra universities from  the year  2001  to 2016 and the information related to the background of the members of the judging teams of these dissertations were collected. For data analysis in order to describe and explain the network the software R was used. The findings of this research shows that the communication structure of arbitration teams is centralist, and this centralism are partly explained by some background characteristics of the network members, including the workplace university, the workplace department, and the university where the doctoral degree is obtained, as well as some scientific factors including specialized field of research, the subject of theses and also the diversity of these .
 

Abstract This study discusses decision-making as a social construction and utilizes qualitative network analysis. Data were collected through in-depth interviews with 15 principals of public upper secondary schools in the city of Shiraz and were interpreted using thematic network analysis. The findings revealed that principals select agents and construct their advisory networks based on their lived experience and common sense. By constructing advisory networks, principals share the definition of the problematic situation with their networks. In this sharing, the mental meanings of principals are affected and changed by the ideas and mental meanings of other agents in networks. Principals make decisions with changed mental meanings. Therefore, principalsﹸ decisions are constructed within a network of relations. Also, findings showed that principals daily face with many problems that they have to decide to solve. So, principals have created   a creative space with their advisory network to be able to adapt to these issues. However, since principals have constructed a flexible structure through their constructing decisions which are not based on theory and are not independent of the will of agents; they are not able to clarify the identity of the problems. As a result, principals usually eliminate troubles temporarily in their decision constructing process,  and problems  remain unsolved.
 

Abstract This paper aims at studying power distribution within the network of political elites' relationships in post-revolution Iran. Theoretically the study may be classified under the subject of political power distribution. Empirically, by implementing the  network  analysis methodology , the construction of the network of relationships and the nature of power distribution among political elites have been investigated. The construction of the power network focuses on the power distribution among members of the 7th to10th administrations of Islamic Republic of Iran.
Empirical evidence indicates that the structure of the political elites' network in the all three administrations exhibits high coherence and density. Data suggests that   though  work , educational, and party affiliations have played a significant role in the political mobilization of elites; but revolutionary struggles and war experiences played a pivotal role in shaping the network of political elites' relationships.
The trend of network construction demonstrates a greater concentration within the eighth and tenth administrations, particularly in party-related relationships. Despite the high homogeneity and similarity within the network of political elites' relationships in the studied governments, a comparison of the network structure between the seventh to eighth and ninth to tenth administrations distinguishes two homogeneous groups. Members of the seventh and eighth administrations form one group, while the ninth and tenth administrations constitute the other one , indicating a bipolar space within Iran's political sphere.

Abstract This article tries to evaluate the therapeutic mechanisms of Narcotics Anonymous society (NA) and Congress 60 as an "alternative social network" for the treatment and preventing relapse of addiction. Network analysis method have been used for evaluating. The data of this research has been collected by documentary and qualitative methods. Samples in the direct observation method were open sessions of NA, travelers and co-travelers of Congress 60, Nar-Anon, Cmanon, and camps, and group therapy sessions in drug addiction clinics. Samples for in-depth interview method were recovered addicts with more than 5 years of recovery. The results of the research show that the network of social relations and social activities of recovering addicts in NA and Congress 60 are one of the effective factors in motivating them to stay in recovery and fulfill their need for belonging to a social group. Furthermore, recovering drug addicts in the “collaborative training sessions” and “sympathy sessions’ benefit from informational-cognitive supports and openness to themselves, others and the world.

Abstract The modern world has brought deep, continuous and extensive changes to the interactions of members of neighborhood networks in many societies, including the Iranian society. This has led to the problematic of social interactions in neighborhood networks., Taken for granted that majority of population live in urban areas today, the problem has caused negative consequences for a large part of the population and has caused some of their needs not to be met. The paper aims at providing a list of the problems in neighborhood networks, as well as an empirical typology of these problems.
For this purpose, interviews were used and by successively changing and completing the questions, 16 interviews were conducted with the residents of Mashhad. Based on the results of step-by-step coding, ten categories were obtained:: lack of interaction, shortage of interactions, reduction of interactions, occasional interactions, cold interactions, weakness of warm interactions, non-participation and cooperation of neighbors, distant relationship with neighbors, instrumental interactions and selective relationships.These categories can be classified in two  types: "lack of interaction" and "weakness of warm interaction".