Social media and children in Iran; Survey of Iranian users' views

Document Type : Research Paper

Author

Department of Communication, Faculty of Social Sciences, Tehran University, Iran

10.22059/ijsp.2026.402324.671342

Abstract

With the spread of digital technologies and the unprecedented influence of social media in all aspects of life, children and adolescents, as one of the most active groups in society, have faced countless challenges in this space. This study aims to analyze the views of Iranian users about the effects of social media on children and adolescents, and to examine the concerns, beliefs, and suggested solutions of parents and caregivers. The research method is a survey and data was collected through face-to-face interviews with 14,505 people aged 15 and older living in 31 provinces of Iran in Ordibehesht 1403. The findings show that the majority of respondents (94.2%) believe that children and adolescents' access to cyberspace is harmful, of which 45.4% evaluate it as "very harmful" and 27.3% as "very harmful". Also, 96.3% of respondents emphasize the need for family supervision of children's activities in cyberspace. The two factors of "concern about the duration of use" and "concern about accessing inappropriate content" were also confirmed by 76% and 80.3% of respondents, respectively. The analysis shows that women and married people and people over 30 years of age express more concern. These findings emphasize the need to formulate comprehensive family and national policies for the safe and intelligent management of children's presence in cyberspace. This research suggests that the approach of "active monitoring" of families can act as an effective defense mechanism. The analysis of the results also showed that concerns differ in different age, educational and ethnic groups.

Keywords

References

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Journal of Social Problems of Iran
Volume 16, Issue 2
May 2026
Pages 5-31

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