The present study was carried out to investigate and analyze the prohibitive cultural and social factors and beliefs of rural women ̕s participation in the process of planning and sustainabledevelopment of the rural residencies of Rustam city. Descriptive-analytical research method was used on the base of searching the library references، field studies and filling out the questionnaire. Gathered data were analyzed by SPSS. Understudy statistical population included rural areas of Shosini village (including Shosini، Zameni and Mir Kheriollah) located in the central division of Rustam with 2813residents and 773 households from which 966 subjects were 18-59 year-old women. A sample size of 275 women was selected. According to respondents،findings indicate that prohibitive social factors of women ̕s participation with an average of 54. 37 are more obvious than cultural ones with an average of 49. 67 in the process of planning and sustainable development of the rural residencies of Rustam city. Also، test results show a significant difference properly. As p-value is less than 0. 05، H0. Hypothesis isn’t acceptable in all cases.

Since plagiarism as an act of intellectual fraud has recently received a global inquiry in different fields of science, especially in second/foreign language (L2) academic writing, developing a valid and domesticized instrument to meticulously assess the awareness and professional integrity of the Iranian academic community to avoid plagiarism seemed indisputable. As plagiarism has been defined differently in various sociocultural and academic contexts, its legal and ethical issues in such scientific fields as L2 academic writing are worth noting (Oghabi, Pourdana & Ghaemi, 2020). Accordingly, two major causes, mostly condemned as contributing factors to committing plagiarism, are the torment the L2 learners usually experience in writing academic texts, and the divisive cultural differences.Not surprisingly, the majority of studies on the causes and consequences of plagiarism were conducted in English-speaking countries (such as Australia) to represent the Western cultural values or social concerns and ethical code of conduct. In Asian or Middle Eastern countries, such as Iran wherein the copyright infringement or unlawful reproduction of original works are rarely subject to serious legal consequences, the absence of vigorous studies on this grave matter is underscored. This is while, majority of scarce studies on this topic generally investigated the contributing factors to plagiarism in the Iranian academic context (cf. Riasati & Rahimi, 2013) and overlooked the potentials of determining factors such as attitude or socio-cultural beliefs of L2 writers. At the same time, in the absence of a domesticized plagiarism questionnaire in the academic context of Iran, Iranian researchers generally make use of accessible questionnaires which often represented the Western culture and ethical values (e.g. Curtis & Popal, 2011; Harris, 2001; Idiegbeyan-Ose et al., 2016; Maxwell et al., 2006).

After a comprehensive review of research literature and conducting semi-structured interviews with graduate students of English language studies (n = 24), the researchers adapted a general conceptual framework for developing a prototype plagiarism questionnaire. The non-randomly selected participants partaking in the semi-structured interviews, the pilot and final research participants were all MA graduates and graduate students of English language teaching, English literature, English translation, and linguistics in three State and Islamic Azad University branches in Iran (n = 288). Initially, 39 out of 47 items in the questionnaire were rated on a 5-point Likert scale, ranging from (a) strongly disagree, (b) disagree, (c) I don’t [1]know, (d) agree (e) strongly agree, which represented the components of participants’ awareness and attitude towards plagiarism. Eight more triple-choice items were constructed in terms of short authentic paragraphs and their corresponding paraphrased texts, each followed by three choices of (a) plagiarism found, (b) no plagiarism, and (c) I don’t know, to represent the component of perception. After carrying out the pilot administration of the questionnaire (with 224 participants), item revision and deletion (11 items excluded), exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, and structural equation modeling (SEM) with SPSS 21 and AMOS statistical software, the researchers developed the final draft of the sociocultural plagiarism questionnaire with 36 items.
 

To explore the first objective in this study, the statistical results in this study supported four components of awareness, attitude, sociocultural beliefs, and perception as responsible factors for determining sensitivity to plagiarism in Iranian academia. Data analysis also indicated the participants’ adequate awareness of the plagiarism policies and their accurate perception, but relatively neutral and irresponsible attitude towards plagiarism downsides, and non-scientific sociocultural beliefs which ultimately provoked them to commit plagiarism. It was concluded that concepts, such as ‘intellectual property’ and ‘ownership of words’ which are deeply rooted in Western culture have not been adequately incorporated into the Iranian academic culture yet. Moreover, Iranian scholars prioritized personal relations or vocational gains over following rules of copyright are proved as widespread in the Iranian academic context.The second objective of this study was examined through frequency analysis of the instances of plagiarism in the Literature Review sections (Chapter II) of the 18 selected MA theses written in English. Relied upon the reports of plagiarism incidence conducted by iThenticate plagiarism detection service at www.Lingaline.com, a widespread and growing number of committed plagiarism by Iranian MA graduates of English language studies during 2013 - 2017 were echoed. In the reports, the rate of plagiarism was higher in men (67.16%) than in women (63.91%); higher in Islamic Azad University branches (78%) than in state universities (56%); and committed more by the MA graduates of English literature (71.66%) than English translation (62.66%) and English language teaching (61.66%). The researchers’ justifications on the obtained results were the absence of clear-cut instructions to rules of plagiarism, strict anti-plagiarism policies as well as adequate institutional attention to this unethical and unprofessional behavior in the Iranian academic community which eventually degraded the gravity of plagiarism to such a large extent.

The results of this study invoked the fact that not only the Iranian academic community requires upheaving awareness and acute perception by every member towards plagiarism unfortunate consequences, but also the non-scientific and desensitizing nature of Iranian sociocultural beliefs towards plagiarism need reconsideration and national policy making. Moreover, in line with Ayoubi (2017), the findings in this study encourage the educators and university professors to implement further tutorial courses to accentuate the severity of plagiarism misconduct and to rip off every chance of committing plagiarism by the university students in their academic writing. Despite promoting this newly-designed sociocultural plagiarism questionnaire as a more reliable assessment instrument for evaluating the Iranian academic community, the current researchers are reasonably skeptical of yielding similar results with Iranian university students at lower educational levels where the curricular demands of writing courses are more into the accuracy of the content over form and mechanics of writing; neither with Iranian university students of non-English majors due to their intended audience who are mostly Persian-speaking readers with similar insensitivity towards plagiarism infringement acts. Last but not least, the current researchers deployed a non-random convenience sampling procedure to have access to a large number of participants which inevitably lowers the generalizability of the findings to different demographic contexts.

The most important way to control COVID-19, with high contagiousness and no specific treatment, is prevention. Due to the lack of a similar study, this research aimed to assess Covid-19 anxiety and the factors affecting the preventive behaviors of Covid-19 from the perspective of clients referring to the comprehensive health centers according to the social and cultural beliefs of the region. This cross-sectional study was conducted on 400 patients referring to comprehensive health centers of Birjand during the outbreak of COVID-19 in 2022. In this study, after obtaining informed consent from the clients, a researcher-made questionnaire regarding COVID-19 preventive behaviors, the COVID-19 anxiety scale, and the demographic information checklist were completed by participants. The most preventive behavior in the studied clients was wearing a mask when leaving home. The mean score of preventive behavior in women was significantly higher than that of men (P<0.001), and the mean score of preventive behavior according to the occupation of the clients was significantly different from each other (P=0.010). There was a positive and significant relationship between the anxiety score and preventive behavior of subjects, with a correlation coefficient of 0.321 (P<0.001). The correlation coefficient between risk perception and preventive behavior against Covid-19 was 0.325, while between vulnerability and preventive behavior, it was 0.333. Considering the relationship between anxiety and preventive behavior of individuals, it is possible to promote preventive behavior in individuals by increasing the awareness and appropriate information about the serious complications of the disease, as well as the ways of transmission through the national media and cyberspace.

Reputational homicide is a common phenomenon among the Iranian tribes and traditional societies and stems from the traditional structure, tribe lives,patriarchal governance and instrumental abuse of women.The present study aims at clarifying the social-cultural factors affecting the reputational homicides among the Iranian tribes.Questionnaire was used to collect the required data. 900 tribes formed the statistical population from which 267 families were randomly selected.The findings showed that variables are related to the tribal beliefs and the collective conscience have direct significant relationship with reputational homicides and variables such as a social trust, localization, and individualization have reverse relationship with reputational homicide.

Nowadays, unnecessary cesarean sections (C-sections) are deemed as a cultural issue. In fact, true beliefs of pregnant women about vaginal delivery have been replaced by misconceptions about C-section like being a fashion or as an indicator of high social class. This study aimed to compare the cultural beliefs about mode of delivery in pregnant women and women with experience of either vaginal delivery or C-section in Tonekabon, Iran, in 2014. This study was performed based on a comparative descriptive design. The sample consisted of 444 pregnant women and women with experience of either vaginal delivery or C-section attending the clinics of obstetricians and gynaecologists or healthcare centers in Tonekabon for prenatal or postpartum care. Pregnant women with obstetric problems that were imposed to have cesarean surgery were excluded from the study. To collect the data a researcher made questionnaire containing seven factors was used. The validity and reliability of the tool was confirmed using content and construct validity as well as internal consistency method, respectively. Descriptive and inferential statistics (ANOVA, Kruskal-Wallis, Mann-Whitney, and Tukey) were used to analyze the data. The mean score of cultural beliefs influencing childbirth decision-making in women with natural childbirth experiences (24.78±2.70) was higher than those of the pregnant women (23.53±3.01) and women with cesarean experiences (24.03±2.66) (P=0.001). Also, there was a significant difference between the three groups regarding the mean scores of aspects of cultural beliefs about childbirth. Frightening thoughts about vaginal delivery are prominent in women. Physicians and media could have important roles in raising awareness to overcome these beliefs. Hence, to promote a positive cultural attitude towards vaginal delivery informing the mothers about the nature of childbirth and correcting their misconceptions could be of great benefit.

Today, social health along with physical, mental and spiritual dimensions of health, has become very important. Women facing infertility, more than other people are influenced by socio-cultural conditions and beliefs of every society. The aim of this study was to determine the social factors affecting the sexual experiences of women facing infertility.
This qualitative content analysis approach study, with regard inclusion and exclusion criteria, was done on 15 infertile women and key informant. Data were analyzed by conventional content analysis method. Gaba and Lincoln criteria were used to confirm the accuracy of the data.
By analyzing the data, three categories were obtained: 1) the impact of relatives and family on experiences (family and relatives of women, family and relatives of men and factors affecting both families); 2) the impact of society on experiences (lack of sexual education and social factors); and 3) common beliefs (beliefs related from cultural, religious or ethnic origin, beliefs related from nutrition, and the impact of schema on sexual behavior).
In Iran, according the social, cultural and religious background, childbearing is very important. It recommended, conducting educational classes for infertile couple families and special sexual health counseling for infertile couples. This consultation will help couples improve sexual performance, correct misconceptions, and reduce marital conflicts and divorce