Sociological Explanation of the Share of Social Capital in Social Mobility

Social mobility is an important subject in the social domain and has been the focus of considerable investigation among scholars as it entails significant consequences both on macro and micro levels. Therefore, this essay aims for a sociological explanation of social capital’s contribution in shaping social mobility. The research method is survey while questionnaires are used as a means of data collection. The statistical population consists of Shirazi citizens of 25 years of age and older, of whom 395 persons are selected using the Cochran's formula.  Bourdieu's theory is used to study the effects of social capital on social mobility. Accordingly, social capital is examined across three dimensions: social trust, social participation and collective cohesion. Our results indicate that the mean social mobility among the sample population is less than average (1.75). Also, among the average components of social capital, social trust ranks lowest (2.06). There is a significant and positive correlation between social capital and social mobility. In terms of social capital’s dimensions, there exists a significant and positive correlation between social trust and collective cohesion with social mobility, whereas no significant correlation between social participation and social mobility is detected. As for personal variables, there is a significant relationship between age, education, activity status, residential area and social mobility. The r2 value shows that 47% of the variations in social mobility can be explained by the independent variables entered in the analysis.