The Major Social Functions of Religion and Indexing of them (among the Students of University of Tehran and Shahed University)

One of the central concerns in the Sociology of Religion is the social functions of religions. The purpose of this study is indexing and measurement of some of the major functions of religion including social solidarity, social control, social participation, and religious-based identity. The aspects, principles, and items related to these factors are elicited with reference to the well-known theories of the field, and are tested among the statistical society of the research, that is the students of the University of Tehran and Shahed University. The population of the sample consists of 382 students and the sampling method is stratified. The validity is tested by face and criterion validity and for the test of reliability, Cronbach's α (0.86) is used. In addition, for measuring the accuracy of questions, parametric tests such as factor analysis have been used. The results of the tests are as follows: 72.8% of the respondents believe that religion is the cause of solidarity for themselves and others; 56.2% understand religion to be preventative against misconduct; 79.4% consider religion as enforcing social participation; and 68% claim to have religious identity.