JOURNAL OF HUMAN SCIENCES
Year:2007 | Volume:- | Issue:53 (SPECIAL ISSUE ON SOCIOLOGY)|Papers Count:19

"Social Capital" has been one of the main issues in social research over the past decades. The contemporary massive literature made this term a "mythical concept" so that many researchers considered it even as a social theory, and not only a keyword in social sciences. But "social capital" is not new; it is the continuation of the nostalgic approach of the Ideologists of the 19th and the Nationalists of the 20th centuries. In addition, the term "capital" is not used in its correct meaning. Therefore, "social capital" is "something" that is never touchable for actors but, indeed, in traditional societies it is equivalent to the norms which actors internalized/"and in modern societies, it is the sum of the capacities and abilities which actors obtain.

The recent urban changes are different in nature and contain complex processes than the past. They are part of more fundamental processes of transformation. In other words, cities have recently entered a new phase or, at least, begun a distinctive transitional phase in response to changing economic, political, social and cultural conditions, urban restructuring or transformation. The restructuring changes are quantitative and qualitative in their nature. New urban forms will produce through this process and this, in turn, will define the urban functions and related social status. This paper tries to clarify the main factors affecting the urban restructuring process in Shiraz city, one of Iran's metropolitan. Urban-restructuring process takes place by affecting two general factors, internal and external, governmental policies, private sector functions and urban local decisions which will lead to new urban structure.

Public participation is an activity in which the citizens try to directly or indirectly influence the selection of government members, the ruling party or its programs and actions. Elections can be seen as one of the most important forms of this participation and has a great impact on the society in general and every individual in particular. Choosing the policymakers, selecting policies and programs, ruling procedures in the society, power rotation, putting pressure on authorities, responsiveness of the ruling party and selective institutions, legitimizing the political system, maneuvering against overseas powers, boosting the ties and interests, creating social cohesion and solidarity in the society, higher accountability of the citizens, reducing inequality, more emphasis by the elites on their desires, expressing opposition and dissatisfaction, and finally, decreasing stress and psychological pressures could be considered as the main outcomes of elections. In general, there are two major factors, individual and socia-political, which affect public participation in elections. In this research, after reviewing the literature, public participation is examined using the data of the ninth presidential election.

This article based on an explanatory approach is aimed to provide new insights about the effects of society structure on attitudes and behaviors of social actors. To accomplish this aim, a secondary analysis of some data of the "Survey of Attitudes and Behaviors of State University Students" were made, The survey was conducted on a sample of 1522 male and female students in 2001. This writing examines the effect of socio-economic status as a prominent aspect of society structure on university students' attitudes and behaviors. The data indicates that belonging to different levels of socio-economic statuses have influential and significant impacts on students' attitudes, orientations and behaviors. This research indicates the fact that the social stratification system is able to form different subcultures and social identities.

Khosestan province has various ethnic groups. The economic conditions of these groups are different. Two approaches explain these differences. The extrinsic oriented approach emphasizes on external factors, namely macro factor imposed by can be external conditions of ethnic community. The intrinsic oriented approach, despite recognition of the impact of external structural factors, tends to view the internal culture of each group accountable for economic differences. This study is based on the second approach. A social survey was conducted among three main ethnic groups: Lur, Arb and Desfuli. Findings show that about 45 percent of individual economic achievements explained by individual differences and 19 percent apparently resulted by ethnic differences which demand further investigations.

South Africa shows some similarities 10 Iran in respect of revolution resources and social problems. Their problems and ways of solving could be useful for us. Besides observable harmony and function there are enough grounds for disharmony and dysfunction. Racial conflict and marked inequality provide the potential of conflict much more than in the USA. After more than 3 centuries, now the blacks have the power and with that, there arises the process of social comparison with whites, feeling relatively deprived and new wishes. As a result the crime is rising and the blacks tend to kill white farmers and rape white women, ete. Also the state tends to act in the same direction and reply to the wishes of voters 10 reduces the room for the whites. In turn, the whites are unhappy of course and tend to leave the country. But without them South Africa will become another country and loose rapidly its privilege in Africa and the world.

The aim of this paper is to investigate the relationship between gender stereotypes and role conflict which occurs in a marriage setting. Three theories have been used here: Goffman's dramaturgical analysis, Merton's role set, and the liberal feminism. The statistical society includes young married women (20 to 35 years of age) residing in Shiraz, whose length of marriage has surpassed the age of one year. The sample encompasses 287 persons. The research tool consists of two questionnaires: role conflict and gender role (BSRI). Role conflict has been measured in eight domains of: education, employment, financial management, domestic tasks, sexual and affective relations, family and friendship ties, leisure, and the child rear. For data analysis descriptive statistics, significance tests, variance and regression analyses, and path analysis were used. The findings show that a commitment to gender stereotypes reduces the degree of role conflict. Moreover, women with higher and better education, higher status of own or that of the spouse's family, higher income level, experience less role conflict. Nevertheless, with an increase of working hours and diversification of women's roles, the degree of role conflict increases.

Aging is a natural process in human life, and is the result of the gradual decline of vital organs of the body. Social, cultural, economic, and individual factors (like sex, race, and age) affect the time and degree of aging. It imposes many costs on the society in various ways. This variety is caused by individual life styles, social relationships, and cultural and financial capabilities. Although the developed industrial countries have ample access to financial resources to handle the needs of the old people in their countries, they have indicated the phenomenon of "old age" as "dead-end", "unprecedented economic burden", and "a predominant problem" which requires serious measures. Experience in some countries shows that applying scientific methods and approaches in order to give the old people an opportunity to continue their economic-social activities in no way will cause serious obstacles for the young people to play their role, whereas it somehow strengthens the sense of usefulness in the aged ones. In developing countries, it is possible to provide .such conditions for the elderly people, though there is a long way to achieve suitable opportunities in most of these countries.

The main question of this research is "what is the content of social relationships of Iranian urban women?" To find an answer the modern and traditional factors which have formed the women's social relations should be accounted for. Then a mixed research method has been designed for the study. This method includes a main section of quantitative-survey and an undominant section of qualitative and historical research to support the quantitative-survey section. Theoretically according to Robertson's view of Glocalization, it has been predicted that all the elements of social relationships network could be recognized by paying attention to the rate of women's access to modern factors and traditional factors (regarding the historical background of women there are two main factors of academic education and employment that impress the Iranian Urban women's situation). It has been seen that there is a mixture of traditional and modern factors. There were two main types of family and role relationships that represent Iranian Urban women's social relationships. There are some meaningful differences between the extent and content of social relationships of women in different groups of educated and employed women, educated and unemployed women, uneducated and employed and unemployed and uneducated women.

The purpose of this study is the evaluation of the relationship among bio-environmental knowledge and attitudes with behaviors. By using stratified random sampling method, 242 students from four courses (environmental health, natural geography, psychology, history) were selected. The factor for bio-environmental knowledge was passing of some units about environment that for this purpose two courses, environmental health and geography, were selected. Students filled the pro-environmental behavior and environmental attitude questionnaires which contained three subscales: ecocentrism, anthropocentrism, and environmental apathy. The results showed that the knowledge about environmental problems had meaningful effect on pro-environmental behavior. The anthropocentric view was correlated positively with pro-environmental behavior, while the association between environmental apathy and anthropocentric was not found. In addition, an ecocentrism is correlated positively with pro-environmental behavior, and negatively with apathy.

According to structural-functional approach, society as a social system consists of different subsystems and institutions. Existence of dynamic balance and state of functional balance between these subsystems and institutions is one of the main causes of progress and development of each society. No doubt university and industry are two most important social institutions of modern societies that have important roles in the development trend of these societies. The present research tries to illustrate and describe the relations between these two institutions in the context of existing social interactions of Iran today and tries to use pathology and explain why there is such a relation in a historical-sociological context and at last tries to suggest some solutions.

While the dominant paradigm in sociological analyses still remains social problems as taken-for-granted, objective and quantitative condition by addressing explanatory or “why-questions” and, additionally, by asserting the measurable, predictable, manageable and interventional nature of these problems, this paper talks about medicalization of social problems, accentuating on the subjective, definitional, constructionist and claim-making-driven nature of these problems. Inspired by some key social constructionists in sociology, the paper seeks to explain that to what extent how-questions or posing questions on the processes of definition, typification and construction of social problems is substantively' integral to the sociology and issues arising from it Taking the similar angle, this paper aims to show how or by which ways or mechanisms an increasing number of human problems, experiences and vital events once treated as normal or natural, and were defined and managed in non-medical realms, have come into the jurisdiction and designation of the medical profession through the past century or so, the process that has been termed here the medicalization of society. The paper, as a final point, addresses the sociological metaphor of “Medicalization Game” to provide a real Image on the nature of medicalization and its potential shifts.

This article is investigating the level of social trust based on social approach. We assume that social trust (as the main concept of this research) is an important aspect at social relations and the cause of social participation among members of society. The main question is whether the level of social trust among students of Zanjan universities, as the pivot of social relations, have relation with personal and situational traits of students, social interactions with social groups, level of social capitals (social security, supporting social discipline, social commitment social anomy, social alienations, social hope, social correlation, social rank, social power, social ability to risk). Results show that according to students there is a keen relationship between some factors affecting social trust (specially social participation, social correlation, social anomy, social alienations, social hope, social ability to risk social security, supporting social discipline, social commitment) and social trust. This relationship between some other factors such as (social rank, social power) has a medium state. Thus, In the ultimate analysis of variations (level of social participation, social correlation, social security) in comparison other variations in Iran have become notable in a way that it has gained the most importance in clarification and anticipation of social trust in impressments of theoretical discoveries of this research, while supporting the relation between social trust and most of the variations considered in minor viewpoints, it is useful achieve perception of major phenomenon which include trust and it is a factor in combining minor and major approaches in the form of a conceptual framework for social trust.

National self-efficacy differentiates between developed and undeveloped nations. Studies have indicated that human resources in developed countries are self-efficacious and strategic plans have intended to boost this trait worldwide. In this research article, four-dimensional model of justice is applied to enhance self-efficacy and results demonstrate that there is a significant and positive correlation between justice and self-efficacy. Implanting justice in educational institutions is necessary to increase self-efficacy in educational institutions and society as a whole.

Many Sociologists have regarded family as the most important institution which is effective as constituting cells of the society in the matters of its soundness or unsoundness. As we know, the forming factor of a family is marriage. Therefore, the society, and family's health is dependent upon a healthy and permanent marriage. Since, considering and paying attention to the issue of marriage and the obstacles and difficulties in its way should be studied as a social problem. In this research which is derived from a research titled as: "To study the Reasons and Effects of Higher Ages for Marriage of Rural Girl in Ashtian City's Villages in 2006", it is attempted to analytically and critically study the influencing social factors on higher ages for marriage of the rural girls and its relevant consequences, accordingly. Furthermore, some issues are to be studied and debated here, for instance, why and how living in rural environments and therefore the accompanied and consequent social problems thereafter (including social poverty and unemployment) could have caused marriage and permanent residence of the rural men in cities and therefore sex imbalance in the villages?, in a manner that we see an increased number of single girls living in villages as well as delayed marriage ages, and as a result, increased social disorders (impairments) and deviations might be expected.

Recent decades were a kaleidoscope of fads and fashions in research-based approaches (or systematic methods for investigating the social phenomena) in social sciences, qualitative approach to social sciences being one of them. A closer look at the literature on the methodology for social sciences reveals a gamut of potentials and privileges as well as several weaknesses and flaws in qualitative approaches. From a historical point of view, the roots of the debate can be traced to mid 19th century. Yet, divergence between qualitative and quantitative approaches might be examined from three different but related perspectives: a paradigmatic view, a contrastive view (to compare the specific features and qualities of their findings), and from an ontological and epistemological standpoint. Propounding the paradigmatic specifications of each approach and comparing them with the nature of their findings based on the basic assumptions of each paradigm, the present paper, while providing a typology of the specifications of both approaches, attempts to analyze the nature and the capability of merging these two kinds of approaches and their findings.