Internet Users Lived Experiences of Cultural (Values, Norms and Verbal Symbols) Changes in Iran Higher Education : Ethics and Philosophy topics

Abstract

The present study qualitatively assesses Internet users' experiences of cultural changes. The type of method is phenomenological. Research participants were 14 university students from Khorasgan Islamic Azad University with intensity case sampling. The subjects were introduced by the administrator of the Internet site. Data collection was conducted by a semi‑structured interview and data were analyzed by Colaizzi 7‑step method. Total findings of this study after excluding common codes, including 236 concept codes that represented the experiences of participants in this study, were classified in three main themes as follows: 1 ‑ Change of Values such as Opinions, Beliefs and Morality (" Change of Beliefs " and " Lack of the Observation of Moral Laws ") 2 ‑ Norm Change ( "Life Style Changing" that come from Change of Tasks Doing Way, Change of Communication Way, Accelerate of knowledge exchanging and Social Participation Changing and " Change of Identity "that come from False Freedom and Corruption, Distrust, Social Change and Change of Wearing Mode ) and 3 ‑ A Change in Verbal Symbols (" Influence of English Words in Farsi "and" Getting Loan Terms from the Internet " ). These findings indicate that students have acquired a lot of positive and negative experiences while using the Internet which have affected the norms, ideas, beliefs, ethics and verbal symbols showing cultural changes in the society which mostly affect the young.