Successful parent's experiences regarding factors affecting a healthy family: a qualitative research

Successful parents have a crucial role in creating a healthy family and a healthy family is the foundation of a healthy community. Thus, the present research was conducted with the aim to investigate successful parents’ experiences regarding factors affecting a healthy family. In the present qualitative research, the phenomenological approach was used. For this purpose, 13 successful parents with a minimum of 15 years of marital life and high level of health and marital satisfaction were selected using purposive sampling method. The participants were studied via exploratory and in-depth interviews during a 12-month period. Data were collected, registered, encoded, and classified into 5 main categories. Through the analysis of the participants’ experiences 429 primary codes, 27 subthemes, and 5 main themes were identified. The main themes included personal, marital, familial, parenting, and social factors. Different factors such as responsibility, forgiveness, maturity, commitment, intimacy, acknowledgment, attempting to please one another, cooperation, reciprocal caring, sexual satisfaction, familism, monitoring, flexibility, leisure time, not following fashion, and contact with relatives contribute to building a healthy family. Although these factors have a fundamental role in shaping a successful family, they have been overlooked. Therefore, with regard to marriage, it is necessary to pay more attention to social and cultural factors.