Investigating the Reasons and Consequences of Students' Silence in the Classroom

The present study aim was identifying the reasons and consequences of students' silence in the classroom. Therefore, a qualitative approach and an exploratory grounded theory method was used. The research population involved students of the public universities in Tehran who were selected 25 of participants by criterion sampling and theoretical saturation in the findings. Research tool was a semi-structured interview and for the data analysis the content analysis method in three stages, open coding, axial coding and selective coding were used. In order to get assured of the validity of the data, two methods of member-checking and peer -checking were used. The findings showed that the factors and consequences related to student’s silence in the classroom can be categorized six factors and consequences, the factors related to the instructor, student and organization, as well as the consequences related to instructor, student and organization.