فصلنامه جامعه شناسی کاربردی
سال سی و سوم شماره 4 (پیاپی 88، زمستان 1401)

Introduction :

In low fertility settings, couple's decision to have children is usually a planned and complex decision that the couple makes based on consideration of their individual and family life on the one hand and considering the social and economic conditions of society on the other hand. Child-bearing is an individual action at the private or micro level. In fact, future-oriented decisions are associated with the decision-making process of whether or not to have a child. However, in recent years, this issue has been at the center of concerns at the societal levels. This study aimed to provide a deep understanding of decision-making processes and childbearing behaviors. Isfahan City as one of the low fertility contexts in Iran was an ideal research field for the present study. Recent estimates made by the Statistical Center of Iran showed that the total fertility rate of Isfahan Province in 2020 ranged between 1.3 and 1.5. It was expected that this figure for the city of Isfahan was even well below that of the provincial estimate. The sample of the present study included the single and married people of child-bearing ages, who were considered influential actors in childbearing.

Materials & Methods :

The present paper employed an inductive qualitative method by using the Grounded Theory (GT) approach. The data was collected from 30 single and married men and women of childbearing ages by using in-depth interviews. The respondents were selected based on the gradual sampling strategies, which were mostly based on theoretical (theory-based) sampling, snowball sampling, and sampling with maximum variety. Lincoln and Guba's (1985) criteria were used to achieve the validity. First, a member check was applied so that after analyzing the findings, concepts, and categories, some participants were asked to evaluate and express their views on the accuracy of the findings. Second, control was exercised by the scientific and expert counterparts on the subject. Third, data analysis and coding were performed by open, axial, and selective coding methods using Maxqda 2020 software package. 

Based on our analysis and coding, 20 main categories were extracted from the data. The central category in this study was "value modification from parenting". The results generally reflected the fact that economic fears, futurism, social responsibility, and accumulated concerns engaged families in rational decision-making. Economic fears, job insecurity, and fragility of economic parameters, sick and unstable economy, and economic hardships that families faced were the key factors in creating doubts about childbearing among couples. The participants considered the decision of whether to have or not to have children. It was a responsible and informed decision that a couple could make and would thus bring requirements and obligations for them. These calculations not only led to a variety of strategies in the Iranian families, including delay in childbearing, preference for remaining childless or intending to be a single-child family, and desiring and planning for migration to another country, but also caused them to undergo a kind of metamorphosis and value shift regarding parenting and childbearing. Consequently, children lost their former status and was replaced by other values. The findings of this study are in line with the risk aversion theory, as well as some other theoretical models that emphasize the effects of economic security and social support on fertility intentions and behaviors. The results also has policy implications for rising fertility levels. The success of the recent pronatalist population policy depends upon a realistic understanding of the couple's childbearing desires, as well as challenges and strategic plans to facilitate their reproductive ideals and intentions. Conducting research with mixed methods in the future, which combines both the quantitative and qualitative elements of research, can enhance understanding of fertility intentions and preferences.

One of the most important human issues in all historical periods has been the issue of educating the young generation to enter the society and socialize them. Human is a multidimensional being and all aspects of his existence need to be trained. Therefore, education is one of the essential needs of humans to be on the right path of life. It can provide opportunities for all-round growth. Achieving the goal followed by human creation is possible only in the light of education. For this purpose, God Almighty endowed human with the power of intellect and the tools of knowledge and inspired the prophets with clear reasons and firm rules and laws. He entrusted them with the mission of educating man. In the document of Fundamental Transformation of Education, which is a roadmap for transformation of education for Iran to realize its vision in 1404, and based on the teachings of the Qur'an, upstream documents, such as the 20-Year Vision Document and the comprehensive scientific map of the country, have been prepared and education has been studied as theoretical and practical foundations. One of the six areas of interest in the document related to the country's education system is the social and political fields. Since one of the duties of any educational system is to educate an ideal and desirable citizen, who can pave the way for the development and progress of the society with responsibility and commitment to the political and social norms and values of his community, teachers can undoubtedly pave the way for providing their students' political and social orientations with their morals, opinions, and political and social behaviors in the schools and classes due to being able to directly communicate with their students, while having greater knowledge and insight. During education, the role of a teacher is much more prominent than any other elements of the educational system because students often work in the school under his/her supervision. He/she transmits not only his/her knowledge and information, but also all his/her attributes, temperaments, moral characteristics, and outward behaviors to the students. However, he/she must have the basic competencies to be able to fulfill his/her mission well and provide education in a style accepted by the education system of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the competencies expected from the teachers in the fields of social and political educations. Accordingly, the present study mainly tried to answer the question of what basic competencies teachers should have to be able to provide the ground for realization of social and political educations.

The purpose of this study was to identify teachers’ basic competencies for realization of social and political educations in the Transformation Document. This study was a qualitative research with a phenomenological method. The participants were the teachers of the teacher-training centers and the faculty members of the Department of Social, Political, and Educational Sciences of Isfahan and Yazd universities. The snowball purposive sampling method was applied to include 30 people in the study through semi-structured interviews until data saturation was achieved. The validity of the codings was confirmed by the method of member and peer reviews.

The findings showed that the basic competencies required for the teachers in the fields of social and political educations included social and political knowledge (social and political literacies), social and political insights (values and individual tendencies, values ​​and collective tendencies, and national and transnational values), and social and political behaviors (individual, collective, and political attributes). Based on the research results, it is recommended that these competencies be used as a practical guide for designing teacher-training and in-service training programs for teachers to provide a platform for spreading Islamic patterns of thought and action based on the Teachers’ Transformation Document.

The emergence of feminism, movement of women and consequently, ever-increasing presence of women in the society, and social evolutions, as well as egalitarianism and development of egalitarian values, especially among women, have significantly increased to the point that women want to play a more prominent role in various facets of the society today. Gender equality has been described as equal rights and responsibilities for men and women and equality in all opportunities in the society. Gender equality and the sense of equality can boost the motivation for community activities and efforts, especially among women, besides being a milestone for the presence of women in different social, political, and cultural fields. Additionally, women’s positive perspective toward gender equality in the public and private spheres of their lives enhances social livelihood, feeling of being seen, and lack of social discrimination among women, thus laying the ground for their activities in social, cultural, and economic levels in the society. It appears that an increase in the levels of social awareness and education can play a significant role in forming egalitarian beliefs and views among women. Therefore, with the assumption that this is the case, in this research, we attempted to analyze the egalitarian viewpoint and some of the factors affecting it among female university students. This study aimed to answer the following questions: Do female university students’ levels of education and ages affect their egalitarian views? Considering the effect of socialization along with social beliefs and values, do the girls have some views on matters, such as marriage and relationship with boys, as well as individualistic views associated with their egalitarian views?

This research was based on qualitative methodology. It was an applied survey. The questionnaire was used as a tool for data collection. Hence, the data in this analysis was the result of a cross-sectional survey. that They were gathered through a structured questionnaire conducted in 2019. The statistical population consisted of the female university students of faculties of Technical and Engineering, Humanities, Basic Sciences, Art, Foreign Languages, and Physical Education. They were studying as undergraduate, graduate, and Ph.D. students at Tehran University in 2019. The sample size was estimated to be 379 by using Cochran formula. Upon predicting the possibility that not all the questionnaires would be filled out and there would be a drop in the number of the students, the sample size was risen up to 400 people. To determine the essential samples, we applied stratified relative sampling and simple random sampling in this research.To analyze the research data, we utilized SPSS, as well as multivariate and bivariate tests. To examine and test the research hypotheses, we first conducted a bivariate analysis and then a multivariate analysis. Pearson correlation coefficient was used to assess the bivariate correlation between the dependent variable, which was an interval (the female university students’ egalitarian views, and the independent variables of age, education, individualism, view toward relationships between girls and boys, and interest in marriage at an interval scale. Furthermore, as both the dependent and independent variables were interval, a multivariate linear regression analysis was performed to have a multivariate assessment between the dependent and independent variables.

The research results revealed that age and education had a significant correlation with the female university students’ egalitarian views. This meant that egalitarian views among the female university students increased with age and education. Additionally, the findings indicated that there was a significant correlation of the girls and boys with egalitarian views. The correlation of individualism and interest in marriage with egalitarian views was significant too. According to the findings, individualism had an inverse correlation with egalitarian views, namely positive egalitarian views increased as individualism declined among the students. Moreover, the results demonstrated that there was a significant correlation between interest in marriage and egalitarian views among the girls, i.e., egalitarian views increased as interest in marriage rose up.Due to this different finding, the inverse correlation between individualism and egalitarian views requires more investigation and a qualitative research is recommended for achieving a more precise analysis. Nonetheless, in the evolving community of Iran, it appears that women and girls’ demands for gender equality have increased due to changes in the society. They want a more prominent share of the society in different social, economic, and political fields. Despite socialization, i.e., the theory of gender socialization, and internalization of values and norms, girls still hold values for marriage and are interested in starting a family. The changes in the values and modern beliefs among girls are significant and have revealed not only individualistic values and positive views on the relationship between girls and boys, but also women’s views on gender equality. Furthermore, they have been manifested under the influence of social context and values in the society.

Participating in sports has many physical and psychological benefits, especially for women and girls. However, despite these benefits, they do not participate much in physical activities either professionally or in public, thus reducing their levels of activity with age. Given the significant role of women in the society and the need to pay attention to their health, identifying the barriers to their participation in sport activities is of high importance. Still, the reasons for their not participating in such activities have remained unclear. Social anxiety about damage to the body may be an important psychological and social factor in the absence of women in sports-recreational activities. Yet, contradictions in the previous research findings have caused ambiguity about this variable. Therefore, considering the contents of the present study, the researcher sought to answer the question of whether there was a relationship of motivation to participate in public sports social anxiety about damage to the body with sports participation of female students in Khansar universities.  

 The present study was a descriptive-correlational survey in terms of purpose and had a practical nature. A questionnaire was used for data collection. The statistical population of this research included all the female students (800 people) studying in Khansar universities in the academic year of 2017-2018. To conduct this research, 254 students were selected as a sample by using Morgan table. The research instrument was a questionnaire of motivation for public sports participation, social anxiety about damage to the body, and sports participation of the studied female subjects. The questionnaires were distributed among them after performing simple random sampling by referring to the mentioned universities To conduct this study, the research purpose was explained to the students, who attended the universities on consecutive days. They were interested in cooperation and answered questions after receiving the questionnaires. First, it was explained to them how to answer the questions. Due to the possibility that a number of questionnaires could not be returned or filled in correctly, 300 questionnaires were distributed among the students and finally 254 correct questionnaires were analyzed. The data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics (one-sample t-test, Pearson correlation coefficient, and regression analysis).  

The results showed that there was a high level of motivation to participate in students' public sports, but there were low levels of social anxiety about damage to the limbs and sports participation. Also, there were a significant negative relationship between motivation to participate in public sports and social anxiety about damage to the body, a positive and significant relationship between motivation to participate in public sports and the studied female students’ sports participation, and a negative and significant relationship between social anxiety about damage to body and the studied female students’ sports participation. Also, the motivation to participate in public sports (0/297) and social anxiety about damage to the body (-0/335) were good predictors of the female students' participations in sports. Domestic studies have proven the role of motivation in sports participation and the role of social anxiety in physical activity has been studied in some cases, but no studies have been conducted on the relationship between social anxiety, motivation to participate in physical activity, and female students’ sports participation so far. The present study attempted to provide a more appropriate picture of the relationship between social anxiety about damage to the limbs and motivation for female students’ participation in physical activities by examining the mentioned variables. It is suggested that those responsible, such as university officials and those in charge of the Sports and Youth Organization, prevent the increase of problems related to social anxiety in this regard and motivate girls to participate in sports activities and increase their self-esteem with the help of psychology by formulating proper training programs. Undoubtedly, conducting such programs has a positive effect on the effective participation of girls in sports activities.

Introduction:

Happiness and vitality have been the raw materials of change, evolution, and social life for human begins. They have been among the indicators of development in societies. In terms of social policy, happiness is also a very important issue because the happier a nation is, the more he/she will feel prosperous. From this perspective and in the field of social policy, happiness is considered by several thinkers as one of the components of social welfare and by others as the end of social policy, in which a person’s needs are met and his problems are managed so that he/she feels happy and satisfied. Happiness is one of the characteristics of Iranian culture and has an impact on family institution. Creating happiness by parents in the family environment can bring dynamism to the society. The happier the parents are, the happier the children will be and vice versa because the people’s happiness in the family is understandable. Because of the importance of happiness in the family environment, the aim of this  research was to explore woman’s role in family happiness.

Materials & Methods:

 The present study was a qualitative research, which was conducted based on thematic analysis in Yazd City in 2019. The study sample included all the married women aged 22-55 years, who had at least one child, in Yazd City. Some of them, including housewives to employees, had up to 3 children. Purposeful sampling was performed with maximum variability. To access the study area, the necessary arrangements were made for those, who wished to be interviewed. The interviews were held in the places where the interviewees were more comfortable and chose themselves. Some interviews were conducted at the interviewees’ homes and some were recorded outside their homes. In-depth interviews were done with 20 women until they were saturated. This meant that interviewing with new samples added no additional information to the research. The times of interviews took from 50 minutes up to an hour and 10 minutes. The interviews were recorded and transcribed. This step was performed with the knowledge of the principle of confidentiality and anonymity of the research participants. In the last step, the data were coded and analyzed by the thematic analysis technique.

Discussion of Results & Conclusions:

The results were presented in 5 final themes: acceptance of the role of motherhood, economic management, acceptance of the role of femininity, interactive-supportive strategies, and elimination of cultural stereo-types. The findings showed that the conditions that created family happiness by women were provided by accepting and playing the roles of motherhood and femininity. Also, putting aside cultural stereotypes and confronting economic problems when dealing with the members increased family happiness. The women sought to increase happiness by creating their own interactive and supportive strategies and an intimate discourse atmosphere in the family. The women of the present study did their best to have a happy and lively family environment since they considered their family members’ happiness as their own happiness. They felt happy when their spouse and children were happy.In fact, happiness for them was summed up as the happiness of their family institutions. It could be concluded that the micro- and macro-level factors in the society affected the way women created happiness in their family environments. This meant that the micro-level factors included psychological factors, such as acceptance of motherhood roles, acceptance of marital duties, and interactive-supportive strategies in individual families. Also, at the macro-level of the society, factors like cultural and economic issues inevitably affected the creation of happiness by mothers in the home environment. Consequently, a type of discourse that creates happiness through cultural and educational institutions in the family institution at the micro level and in the society at the macro level is recommended.

Today, organizations in various fields are facing huge challenges. The common focus of all of them is the development of knowledge, technology and innovation. To quickly adapt to these challenges and changing needs, organizations need to improve their employees’ innovations and creativities. Educational organizations as the most prominent, most influential, and most extensive organizations are responsible for people’s formal education and training in the society, as well as providing human resources to other organizations. They have an important and extraordinary impact on sustainability, social, economic, and cultural aspects of every country. As the most important members and architects of educational organizations and schools, teachers are considered the main element of competence of any educational system. The importance and unique role of creativity and innovative performance of teachers as a strategic source and designer and implementer of organizational systems and products have now found a far higher position in education than in the past. Since the majority of human resources working in the education system are teachers, addressing the current state of creativity, as well as the factors affecting their innovative performance in schools, is of double importance. Based on the findings of previous researches, leadership styles are one of the factors influencing teachers’ innovative performance. Exploitative leadership as a very self-interested leadership style has many negative effects. It leads to a decrease in job satisfaction and emotional commitment, an increase in the intention to leave the job, job burnout, deviant behaviors in the workplace, hiding knowledge, and reducing the employees’ productivity and innovative performance. Hiding knowledge as another factor affecting innovative performance has destructive effects on organizational effectiveness in the current era. As a negative behavior that includes a conscious refusal to provide knowledge and is requested by another person it can disrupt the relationships between employees, lead to mistrust, and be very harmful to individual and organizational performance. Considering that exploitative leaders play an important role in teachers’ attitudes and behaviors and the exploitative leadership style as one of the new leadership styles has not been investigated and studied in the country so far, we decided to fill this research gap by examining the consequences and results of this leadership style in schools and find out the answer to this question: How do exploitative leaders in schools reduce teachers’ innovative performance by hiding knowledge?

The current research was based on an applied goal and with a descriptive-correlation method. The research population included all the teachers of two districts of Shiraz (1945 people). The sample size (319 teachers) was determined based on the simple random sampling method and Cochran’s formula. The questionnaires of Schmid and colleagues (2019) for exploitative leadership with 15 items with 5 subscales of showing selfish behaviors (Questions 1 to 3), applying pressure (Questions 4 to 6), undermining employees’ developments (Questions 7 to 9), gaining credibility (Questions 10 to 12), and hypocrisy (Questions 13 to 15), questionnaires Connelly and Zweig (2015) for concealment of knowledge with 12 items and 3 subscales of evasive concealment (Questions 1 to 4), logical concealment (Questions 5 to 8), and dumbing down (Questions 9 to 12), and questionnaires of Huang and Li (2018) for innovative performance with 7 items and 2 subscales of executive innovation (Questions 1 to 4) and technical innovation (Questions 5 to 7) were used in the 5-point Likert scale to collect the data.

The aim of this research was to investigate the relationship between exploitative leadership and innovative performance through the mediating role of knowledge hiding. The results of the research showed that the leadership variable had a direct, negative, and significant relationship with the teachers’ innovative performance at the level of 0.05; hiding knowledge had a direct, negative, and significant relationship with their innovative performance at the level of 0.05; and exploitative leadership had an indirect, negative, and significant relationship with their innovative performance at the level of 0.05. To improve teachers’ creativities, it is suggested that education officials and school administrators exchange information and knowledge by studying and recognizing the undesirable characteristics of exploitative leadership and the destructive consequences that this leadership style can have on the performance of teachers and schools and thus try to induce creative performance in teachers.

As the most basic social institution and an emotional unit, the family plays a significant role in the social health of any countries. Efforts to strengthen the couple's bond and the relationships within this system provide moral health and general prosperity. However, this relationship has undergone various changes over time and the ups and downs of life, which leave major results. One of the most important results is marital conflict. After a long period of conflict, couples face the stage of hatred and then the state of indifference, which is the last stage of emotional relationships between men and women, and ultimately leads to emotional divorce. This type of divorce refers to a situation, in which the emotional relationship, support, passion, warmth, attention, love, and intimacy between the couple decrease. Emotional divorce is one of the most important family injuries that cause personal, family, and social collapse so that the effects of this tense situation sometimes remain for a long time. Despite the frequency of emotional divorce, this type of divorce is still an unknown phenomenon and it is referred to as the temporary stage of official divorce in many scientific studies. In recent years, official reports and statistics have indicated an increase in the divorce rate in Tehran. According to experts, the share of emotional divorce is more than official divorce. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct research on the drivers of emotional divorce between couples. In this regard, this study aimed to provide a framework for identifying and evaluating the drivers of emotional divorce among Tehranian couples based on the experts’ views. 

This research was an applied research in terms of purpose and a descriptive survey based on the nature of data collection. Besides, was cross-sectional based on the time horizon. The expert panel of this research included sociologists, experts in the field of social sciences, and experienced counselors of family, as well as couple therapists with at least 10 years of work experience in Tehran, who dealt with a variety of couples suffering from emotional divorce. In this research, the required information was available to a special group of experts, who were selected through the snowball method. The data collection was done by two methods library studies and field investigation. Two researcher-made questionnaires were designed to survey the experts in monitoring, screening, and final localization of the factors affecting the emotional divorce among Tehranian couples, as well as their weighting and prioritization. In this research, to analyze the data and identify the final drivers affecting the emotional divorce among Tehranian couples and weighting and prioritizing them, the one-sample t-test and the Group Analytic Hierarchy Process (G-AHP) were respectively used in SPSS and Super Decision software. The group decision-making strategy prevented the bias results and increased the accuracy of decision-making and the results by obeying collective wisdom. 

The results of this research indicated identification of 29 drivers of emotional divorce among Tehranian couples, which were organized into the four dimensions of life skills, personality and behavior, social and sociological aspects, and fields. According to the experts, the social and sociological dimension with a weight of 0.35 had the highest importance among them and contributed more to the emotional divorce among Tehranian couples. It was also observed that among the drivers of emotional divorce, "weakness of communication skills" with a weight of 0.0548 among the dimension of life skills, "betrayal and extramarital affairs" in the behavioral and personality dimension with a weight of 0.0482, "lack of Kefoit and matching of spouse" in the social and sociological dimension with a weight of 0.0545, and "individual’s economic position" in the land dimension with a weight of 0.0546 were assigned the highest degrees of importance. Therefore, it was concluded that the experts and institutions in charge had to use intellectual, financial, and infrastructural capitals in the face of priority drivers. Finally, some appropriate solutions and corrective actions were provided for facing these drivers.