Cultural Orientations in Cyberspace; Surveying the Quantity and Manner Through Which Students Use Cyberspace

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to determine the correlation between social media use and cultural change in the four domains of "social capital", "religious beliefs", "individualization" and "identity". Besides, it was attempted to determine the direction of cultural changes according to Inglehart's Model on Materialistic and Post-Materialistic Values.In this study, library study and survey method were used. The findings of this study showed that respondents' social capital was at an average level and those who used social networks were characterized with lower social capital. In the case of 'individualization', which directs the individuals toward collective action and shared goals such as protecting the environment or creating humanitarian societies, it was found that increased level of using social networks led to boosted individualization.With regard to "identity", the findings also showed that increased use of social networks led to more desire for transparency in users. The results also showed that there was no significant relationship between the two variables of "religious beliefs in social networks" and "social media use". The findings of the research on "interested values in social networks" showed that users were more inclined to the Post-Materialistic values stated in the Inglehart's Model. This finding was in line with the results of research conducted in other countries and there was no distinction between Iranian users and foreigner users regarding values in cyberspace.

Keywords

• cultural changes
• social networks
• social capital
• individualization
• identity
• religious beliefs