Sociological survey of the quality of life of household heads in Zanjan city in 2012

Dissertation

To receive a Master's degree

Sociology Department

Social Sciences Department

Abstract

Statement of the problem: Considering that knowing the quality of life of households is one of the most important matters in the field of determining the lifestyle of social activists, therefore, the present study seeks to study and sociologically examine the quality of life of heads of households in Zanjan city. In fact, the main question of the research is what is the quality of life of families and households in Zanjan city and what are the effective factors in changing the quality of life among the heads of households in Zanjan city?

Research methodology: The current research was carried out using a quantitative method and was implemented using a survey method, which was a tool for collecting data and information through a questionnaire. The statistical population of this research is all the heads of households in Zanjan city, which according to the results of the last census (in 2010) numbered 110,943 households, and using Cochran's formula, 390 households were selected as the population and their heads were studied and investigated. For data analysis, SPSS software was used and to check research hypotheses, based on the measurement level. Descriptive and inferential statistical methods such as correlation coefficients (Spearman, Pearson, etc.) and parametric statistical tests (t-test, analysis of variance, etc.) have been used for the investigated variables.

Research findings: Based on the analysis of the collected data, there was a significant relationship between most of the contextual variables (such as age, literacy, marriage, etc.) with the lifestyle variable and its components. Also, there was a significant relationship between the variables of social trust, quality of life and lifestyle and its components.

Key words:

Quality of life, cultural lifestyle, cultural products, leisure time, household heads.

Introduction

Life is a divine gift that humans benefit from throughout their lifetime. The current century has seen significant changes in the way people view life. In this century, it is not only desirable to preserve life in the usual way, but to improve the quality of life in many fields is considered the basic effort of societies. Having a good quality of life has always been a human desire. At first, this desire was limited to improving people's appearance, such as income, education, physical health, and housing. But now attention is paid to a wide range, including qualitative and mental variables. The quality of life is due to the expansion of the process of industrialization and the advancement of technology, which takes into account the quantitative aspect of human life, and also due to the neglect of the qualitative aspects of human life during the past few decades in Western countries, the discussion of the quality of life has attracted the attention of thinkers and thinkers of humanities.

The present project, in addition to defining the concept of quality of life and avoiding the different dimensions of quality of life, also examines the quality of life and its relationship with the cultural lifestyle in order to provide a specific definition and a precise method. To measure the quality of urban life and take steps towards its improvement. In this project, the city of Zanjan, which, like most cities inside and outside the country, has areas with class differences, and this has caused a different quality of life between different areas of the city, has been considered as a case example. However, it is clear that the quality of life has different meanings for different people, depending on the variables of social class, gender, age, place of residence, marital status, employment status, etc. There are different definitions of the quality of life.

All human beings have been in search of improving their quality of life since the beginning of their lives, but in the modern era, the quality of life has become the subject of study by scientists, because they have realized the fact that the future of society depends on identifying the factors that affect the conditions of human life (Sadeghi, 2013).

The history of the concept of quality of life dates back to the time of Aristotle. It returns in 385 BC. At that time, Aristotle considered "good life" or "doing things well" to mean being happy, but at the same time, he discussed and mentioned the difference in the concept of happiness in different people. The health that makes a sick person happy is not the same as the wealth that makes a poor person happy, and it has been clearly stated that happiness not only has different meanings for different people, but it will not have the same meaning for the same person in different circumstances.Anyway, at that time, happiness or happy life was considered equivalent to what is called quality of life today; But the term "quality of life" was not used until the 20th century (Najat, 2007). Since the 1930s, various scientific researchers have turned to research, analysis, measurement and the importance of the quality of life in different geographical areas and try to explain the quality of life in urban areas and the United States, as well as those related to different nations in the United States. The history of research on quality of life goes back to sociological research, and in the field of mental health, it has started since the 1960s following the deinstitutionalization movement (Zaki, 2017).

Although the concept of quality of life has been the focus of sociologists since the end of the 20th century, its roots in sociology can be traced to the middle of the 20th century. In sociology, the first important work on the quality of life is from Ogburn [1] (1946), which was written about rural life in the United States. In the 1960s, when sociologists reacted against the dominance of economic indicators, the concept of quality of life became important in social research, but until then all quality of life indicators were objective. In the 1970s, subjective indicators were added to measure the quality of life. For the first time, Campbell and colleagues in their work in 1976 paid attention to the subjective and psychological indicators of quality of life[2] (Campbell, 1976).

Various research centers are currently measuring quality of life at the national and international level. In the United States of America, since the 1960s, the Institute of Social Research at the University of Michigan and the Chicago Survey Center have measured the quality of life, and since 1995, with the establishment of the International Association for Quality of Life Research [3], the measurement of this concept has been well institutionalized [4] (Phillips, 2006).

Attention to the concept of quality of life is increasing in scientific societies and among policymakers, and this concept is in many fields of social sciences. and hygiene is used. In fact, it can be said that quality of life is an interdisciplinary concept in social sciences.

Attention to the concept of quality of life is due to the development of less economic views about the quality of social life. The concept of quality of life tries to examine people's living conditions in their own social context. For this reason, he chooses indicators to measure this concept that are highly dependent on the research field (Noghani, 2018).

Defining the problem and stating the main research questions

Quality of life is one of the issues facing the world today and one of the basic issues in the development of social policy. Undoubtedly, during the last three decades, the quality of life, as a substitute for material well-being, has become the main social goal of different countries. Today, the quality of life is one of the accepted theoretical frameworks for examining the living conditions of different societies. According to the available statistics, nearly half of the world's people live in cities and it is expected to increase in the coming decades. In general, this issue can be seen as a result of people's efforts to satisfy their needs and the existence of suitable facilities for urban life in cities. The city as a system has various elements and continuously affects them or is affected by them. This system has smaller divisions under the title of neighborhood. This research examines the quality of life of heads of households living in different neighborhoods of Zanjan city by using different dimensions of quality of life. 

Although the concept of quality of life has many applications, it is difficult to provide a clear and comprehensive definition for it because it has been used in various fields and with different applications. People themselves usually have a clear picture of their quality of life in mind. They usually know that no matter what happens, they will feel happy in life. For example, more income, having a house (or a bigger house), a nice car, more vacations, etc. Also, people usually say clearly that no matter what happens, everyone will feel happiness (collective quality of life). For example, the existence of a peaceful and beautiful neighborhood or city, the absence of traffic, the absence of unemployment and poverty, the existence of medical facilities for everyone, etc.

In fact, when defining the quality of life, since the ideal situation is supposed to be depicted in order to compare the current situation with it, the issue becomes somewhat philosophical.