Effect of social capital and support, and the Internet use on empowering women working in the Tehran RCS with the mediating role of socioeconomic status

Women's empowerment has been introduced as a mechanism to improve the quality of women's work and personal life, one of the basic principles of protecting human rights and eradicating poverty. This study aimed to investigate the effect of social capital, social support, and Internet use on the empowerment of working women with a mediating role in socioeconomic status.

In this descriptive survey study, 4,000 women were studied working in the RCS of Tehran province, Iran. About 384 samples were selected due to Cochran's formula by a simple random method. The required data were collected using some questionnaires, namely the Social Capital (Hoff and Heisman, 2009), subjective assessment of the socioeconomic status (Nabavi et al., 2007), Social Support (Sherburne and Stewart, 1991), the researcher-made questionnaire of Internet Use and Women’s Empowerment. 

The results showed that social capital, social support, and the use of the Internet had a direct impact on the empowerment of women, and socioeconomic status played a mediating role in the relationship between social capital and empowerment. It was also found that socioeconomic status played a mediating role in the relationship between social support and the empowerment of working women.

According to the results, attention to the components of social capital, social support, and the use of the Internet and cyberspace provided the basis for the empowerment of working women, while in this process the key role of women's socioeconomic status should not be overlooked. However, managers' attention to strengthening organizational trust and women's participation in decision-making, providing conditions for good communication, training, and promoting women's media literacy, would increase the socioeconomic status proportionately and  improve women's empowerment.