mohammadreza mazidi

Abstract
Today, the use of mobile social networks has become an important and sensitive issue. It is rooted in several social factors. In the present era, the level of users’ skills has also become a vital issue for human societies. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between users’ skills and positive and negative uses of mobile social networks. To conduct this survey, a multi-stage cluster sampling method was used and 385 young people in Yazd, Iran were selected. The data gathering tool was a questionnaire that was validated with content and structural validity as well as Cronbach's alpha coefficient for reliability. The findings showed that there were significant relationships between the users’ skills and negative and positive uses of mobile social networks. The users’ skills explained 0.33% and 0.14% of the variance of positive and negative uses of mobile social networks, respectively. The results of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) also showed that the model had a suitable goodness of fit.

Virtual social networks are the space for the gathering of billions of Internet users who call and exchange information regardless of frontiers, languages, sex, culture, etc. Each of them has a particular understanding of social networks that are unique to their own. But this understanding and their experiences are grounded in an interpersonal space. The present study used interpretivism paradigm and grounded theory to examine the meanings, perceptions, understanding and experience of Yazd youth in social networks. The target population was university professors, media experts, counseling specialists and youth in Yazd, a sample of them selected based on purposeful and theoretical sampling. The data were collected with non-structured interviews and participatory observation and field notes technique from 32 participants. The research findings included a final core category (Reflexive duality), 11 main categories, 37 sub categories and 94 concepts. The results of the research indicate that the security, trust and yazdian culture are problematic in cyberspace. Thus, research participants reflexively think about cyberspace continuously and with this reason they confront reflexive duality that simultaneously make their existence or absence meaningful.