Iranian Postgraduate Students Research Articles

ՀՀ ԳԱԱ արվեստի ինստիտուտը և պարսկական արվեստի ուսումնասիրությունը

NAS RA Institute of Arts prepares scholars for our neighboring friendly country - the Islamic Republic of Iran. From the year 2008, citizens of the Islamic Republic of Iran do their postgraduate research work at the Institute. Many of them, having completed and defended in due term their PhD theses, are awarded a PhD degree in Arts and/or Architecture. Naturally, their research is mainly focused on the issues of Persian art. NAS RA Institute of Arts Specialized Academic Council in Arts 016, the only one in Armenia, awards academic degrees in all the fields of Art Criticism. At the Specialized Council 016, postgraduate students of not only NAS RA Institute of Arts, but also of Yerevan State Academy of Arts, Yerevan State University and Komitas Yerevan State Conservatory - citizens of the Islamic Republic of Iran, defended their PhD theses. In the article, the contribution of NAS RA Institute of Arts to the study of Persian art is elucidated for the first time. The list and relevant data of the Iranian postgraduate students, who defended their theses at NAS RA Institute of Arts Specialized Academic Council in Arts 016 and received academic degrees of PhD in Arts, was compiled and introduced to academic circles for the first time.

Unsourced evidentiality and critical reading: the case of international postgraduates in Australia

ABSTRACT This paper investigates readers’ recognition of unsourced evidentials in texts in association with critical reading. To this end, we involved four Iranian postgraduate students at an Australian university in a collective case study where each student read four Persian texts and participated in in-depth interviews and focus group discussions. Data analysis employed critical discourse analysis and discursive power relations to examine participants’ positionalities and subjectivities. Our findings in general confirm the students’ recognition of unsourced evidential in texts as an indication of critical reading. More specifically, it was revealed that linguistic sources (e.g. Persian indefinite suffix ‘−i’), as well as socio-cultural factors such as normalization embedded within the Persian oral narrative and discourse, play significantly in identifying unsourced evidentials. Pedagogical implications for critical reflection on texts containing instances of unsourced evidentials are suggested.

Spoken Collocational Errors of Iranian Postgraduate Students

Spoken Collocational Errors of Iranian Postgraduate Students

Determinants of e-learning acceptance amongst Iranian postgraduate students

E-learning can address some of the unmet needs of learners and educational communities; however, not all learners and educators accept e-learning as a delivery modality. This research endeavored to study the factors which affect e-learning acceptance among Iranian post-graduate students using the Davis Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and to identify the changes which would facilitate their improved acceptance and subsequent wider use of e-learning. This descriptive-correlation study was conducted by surveying 320 Iranian postgraduate students using a self-reporting questionnaire. Structural equation modeling was used for data analysis through LISREL software. Results revealed sufficient validity and reliability of the TAM among Iranian postgraduate medical students. Perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness of e-learning, students’ attitudes toward e-learning, and the intention to use e-learning positively affected e-learning’s acceptance (p < 0.05) among Iranian postgraduate students. According to the results, attitudes toward e-learning have more predictive power than other TAM constructs. Therefore, emphasis on students’ favorable attitudes toward e-learning can be effective in accelerating its acceptance and will progress students’ learning outcomes.

Nursing students' perceptions and experiences of learning and using nursing theories: A qualitative study.

No study has addressed the experiences of Iranian nursing students learning and using nursing theories. We investigated the experiences of Iranian postgraduate nursing students learning and using nursing theories. A qualitative study was conducted on 25 Master's degree nursing students who had completed the course of nursing theories in three selected nursing schools in Iran. Semistructured interviews were conducted. Data analysis was performed using a content analysis approach. Most of the students had positive experiences of learning and using nursing theories. Three main categories emerged from the data namely "a refreshing opening," "needing support," and "clinical usefulness." Nursing theories refreshed the students' view of the nursing profession, strengthened their professional values, helped them recognize professional boundaries, and practice a comprehensive care. The nursing education system should prepare expert teachers for teaching nursing theories. Nursing managers should support nurses to implement these theories.

Cost analysis of educational courses of medical students in Iran

Estimating the cost of graduate courses can play an important role in deciding on the allocation of required resources. This study aimed to determine the cost of educational activities of graduate students in hospitals of medical universities in Iran. This study was performed in eight independent educational medical centers of Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. After identifying the cost topics, the required information was collected through a semi-structured interview with the officials and students. Then, the amount of use of the graduate students from the cost headings was determined. The results identified that Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) students of microbiology with more than 950 United States dollar (USD) and PhD students of medical education with about 7 USD have created the highest and lowest costs, respectively. This study, for the first time, examined the educational costs of Iranian postgraduate students in the hospital. In conclusion, the results of this study indicated that the amount of the costs of different fields of graduate education in medical sciences is very different and it should be considered in the allocation of the resources.

Exploring Iranian Postgraduate EFL Students’ Academic Writing Experiences and Expectations: A Dynamic Narrative Approach

In spite of the existence of writing courses for postgraduate students in English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) contexts, their academic writing proficiency remains low. Therefore, EFL students’ academic experiences and expectations need to be explored to identify their needs. To this end, a dynamic narrative approach was adopted to examine the academic experiences and expectations of 21 Iranian postgraduate EFL students qualitatively. The narratives were analyzed based on their plots, values, and significance, adapted from Daiute (2014). The findings revealed that EFL students linked their challenges to insufficient and improper instructions. Furthermore, they asserted that their needs are ignored, and teachers use different criteria and expectations to evaluate their writing. On the whole, students’ expectations about writing courses did not align with their actual experiences. The findings of this study about EFL students’ experiences and expectations draw curriculum designers’ and teachers’ attention to those aspects of academic writing that need to be reconsidered. Understanding the actual requirements of writing courses can bridge the gap between teachers’ and students’ expectations.

Rhetorical structure in the problem statement section of Iranian postgraduate students' research projects

This paper reports the results of a study that investigated the structure of the Problem Statement (PS) section, following Swales’ (1990) Create-A-Research-Space (CARS) model as the first objective. Move analysis was used to analyze the rhetorical moves of the PS sections of the research projects. The second objective was the identification of the specific types of linguistic features associated with each move and step based on Pho’s (2013) classification. Following Pho (2013), the linguistic features as important signals of moves were identified. For this purpose, 30 research projects written by Iranian master’s students were purposively selected. The findings showed that the obligatory moves were Moves 1 ‘Establishing a Territory’ and 2 ‘Establishing a Niche’. All moves and steps were identified linguistically although their sequence and arrangement were not the same as what was anticipated by the model. Although the cyclic and embedded moves were defined in the rhetorical structure of the PSs, most of them were anomalous or ill-structured. The study has theoretical contributions, the most significant one of which is that the CARS model is applicable to define and analyze the rhetorical structure of the PS section.

Cultural and politico-religious challenges impacting critical reading of text for Iranian postgraduates in Australia

Abstract This study investigates the impact of cultural and politico-religious dominance on the practice of critical reading (CR) of texts by a group of Iranian postgraduate students in Australia. Four postgraduate students were interviewed individually four times (each time for reading one text) for critical understanding of two pairs of Persian texts, each with opposing viewpoints, on current socio-political and nationalistic debates of Iran. They were then involved in a focus group discussion for further critique of each other’s viewpoints. Findings indicate two major Persian constructs that influence CR: hefz-e zaaher ‘keeping up appearances’ and ta’sob/gheyrat, approximating to ‘one’s honor combined with prejudice and bigotry’. Findings also reveal that participants’ CR is contributed by heavy emotional attachment to nationalistic views engendered by Persian poetry. Chafe (1982), too, found that emotional attachment in appraising text was true with American English speakers. Finally, the focus group discussion had a slight impact on encouraging CR. Overall, it seems that participants’ repositioned journeys in Australia have influenced their perspective.

Contributing Factors to Migration Growth Among Iranian Students: Drivers of Migration to Malaysia

It is estimated that almost 244 million people have migrated around the world for a variety of complex reasons. For some, (tertiary) education has been the primary motivating factor. Countries that experience a brain drain as a result of migration may suffer a population and cultural loss. Iran is believed to suffer from such a brain drain in their skilled-labour market, otherwise known in many areas as education immigration. This study was undertaken to explore why Iranian students emigrate to Malaysia and what are the most common causes of migration growth that have accompanied this trend. A descriptive analytical research method, cross-sectional in nature, was applied. A sample of 250 Iranian post-graduate and undergraduate students—who were studying in Malaysia—was selected randomly to participate in this study. A self-administered questionnaire was adapted to collect data, which was tested for validity and reliability based on the research scholars’ advice and calculating Cronbach’s alpha coefficient (α = 0.90). ‘SPSS’ v. 19.0 was used to analyse the data. The significance level was set at 0.05. In total, 219 questionnaires were completed. The majority of students (73.5%) were male, and most of them (62.1%) belonged to the age group of 25–30 years. Nearly 65% of the students had been living in Malaysia for 3 years or more. Low tuition fees and living costs (68%), exceptional educational technologies at Malaysian universities (54.3%), the existence of international companies in Malaysia (65.3%), easy entry to Malaysian universities (70.3%), high rankings of Malaysian universities in the world (58%) and greater freedom in social interaction for respondents compared to Iran (49.3%) were the most compelling reasons for these students’ emigration to Malaysia. Further analysis revealed that Iranian students’ intention to emigrate to Malaysia was significantly correlated with socio-political factors and religious concerns in Iran, reasonable tuition fees in Malaysia and access to advanced technologies and international cooperation in Malaysia. Other contributing factors included the simple process of obtaining an entry visa and subsequent resident visa or work permits for Malaysia and the high rankings of Malaysian universities among international institutions (P value < 0.001). Concern over the issue of immigration continues to mount confounding and challenging legislators, politicians, community leaders, policy-makers and academics to develop solutions to overcome it. In the case of Iran, authorities are required to focus on the big picture of the immigration process and should explore the extent of the challenges Iranian students face. They need to secure the employment of graduates produced by educational institutions to ensure their country does not continue to experience brain drain. A more unified effort is required to stop the brain drain by establishing high-tech, affordable and accessible universities in Iran and offering more freedom in the areas of politics, social and religious activities.

Enhancing Comprehension and Production of Argumentation through Critical Thinking Awareness-Raising

Language pedagogy aims to equip learners with tools to cope critically with the complexity of the language input and rationally evaluate the authenticity of the data. An indispensable part of learning to read and write a foreign language should, hence, develop critical thinking skills that allow interpretation and accurate expression of overt and covert propositions. The purpose of this quasi-experimental study was to examine the impact of an eleven-session critical thinking (CT) awareness-raising (AR) mingled with an Advanced Writing Course on 50 male and female Iranian postgraduate TEFL students’ reading comprehension and the accuracy, complexity, and organization of their writing of argumentative texts. The participants in two intact classes were randomly assigned as the experimental and control groups. The treatment followed a reading to writing direction with a stronger focus on explicit presentation and practice of reading-embedded argumentation elements and CT skills in the experimental group. The control group, however, started off with the same materials with now CT focus and proceeded to the detailed process-oriented writing phase. Comparison of the groups’ reading and writing post-test scores verified superior performance of the experimental group in reading and writing of argumentative texts and offer pedagogical implications.

Connecting the dots to see the whole: Learner variables, wellbeing and coping strategies in student narratives‡

Taking a complex dynamic systems perspective and following an adapted theory of wellbeing, the present mixed-methods project looked into the wellbeing of Iranian postgraduate students majoring in English Language Teaching (ELT). The participants included 29 male and 45 female 24–31 year-old students whose language learning histories were analysed for elements of wellbeing and coping strategies. In addition, the impact of learner variables of resiliency, language learning strategy use, multiple intelligences, and language learning aptitude on the participants’ wellbeing was investigated. The elements of wellbeing in narratives written by students were found to be emotional responses, accomplishments, meaningful engagement, and relationships in a descending order. Hierarchical multiple regression showed resiliency, language learning strategy use, multiple intelligences, and aptitude (but not gender) affected wellbeing. While male students used accomplishments, meaningful engagement, emotional responses, and relationships as their coping, their female peers used emotional responses, accomplishment, meaningful engagement, and relationships.

Online Metacognitive Reading Strategies by Internal and External Locus of Control

This quantitative study focuses on online metacognitive reading strategies used by 39 Iranian postgraduate students with internal and external locus of control. The students were selected through locus of control questionnaire and it is followed by OSORS questionnaire to measure online metacognitive strategies used by students. The results of study revealed that online metacognitive reading strategies used mostly by internal locus of control students rather than external locus of control students. There were clear interrelationships among types of metacognitive reading strategies used and internal locus of control characteristics. Among three subcategories of metacognitive strategies, students with internal locus of control are more interested to use global strategies, whereas students with external locus of control tend less to use this strategy. Also, there was no significant difference in using problem-solving and supportive strategies used by the students.

Beyond Expectations: Autonomy and the Iranian Postgraduate Students in Malaysian Public Universities

Iranian learners at all levels of education (primary, secondary and tertiary) face a number of constraints in their studies due to restriction of educational system, cultures, upbringing and expectations of society. Based on this premise the researchers would like to explore the degrees of autonomy as practiced by selected Iranian postgraduate students studying at three premier public universities in Malaysia. Data were gathered using the Learner Autonomy Profile (LAP) developed by Confessore &amp; Confessore (1992). The findings reveal that these Iranian postgraduate students do practice autonomy and know how to apply positive coping strategies in their studies; thus indicating positive contradiction from the normal expectations of Iranian learners’ performance in relation to autonomy. The paper concludes with the impacts and implications of the findings.

Perceptions of Challenges in Writing Academically: Iranian Postgraduate Students’ Perspectives

Academic writing skills are essential tools that postgraduate students reading for their doctoral degree have to master to be able to produce dissertations, research reports and academic assignments of quality in the course of their studies; and publish research-based articles in established journals. This paper discusses the perceptions of a group of Iranian postgraduate students pursuing their doctoral degrees at UPM (Universiti Putra Malaysia) on the challenges they face in writing academically. They provided the data for this paper via their responses to a survey. The findings indicate that these postgraduate students perceived some academic writing skills to be more challenging than the others. The paper concludes with a discussion on the implications of the findings; and recommendations on how the situation can be improved.

End-Users' Perception from Housing Needs Based on Maslow's Theory of Motivation

Providing operational approach to end-users' motivational tendencies in housing facilitates user-centered approach enhancing person-environment congruence. The operational approach is highly critical in case of inaccessibility of end-users in decision making, i.e. mass housing. Therefore, this study aims at explaining end-users' housing motivations from their housing attributes preferences, through a theoretical framework developed based on Maslow's theory. The investigation was carried out by using a self-administered questionnaire conducted on 127 Iranian postgraduate students of Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, and their spouse who lived alongside them. They were selected from those who lived more than one year in mass housing apartments in Malaysia. Using exploratory factor analysis, the housing attributes preferences were analyzed to underlie the latent structure and relations among them; the extracted factors were also labeled based on the different level of needs. Then, conducting one sample t-test hierarchical tendencies among the different motivational factors were identified. Referring to Maslow's theory to explain the concept and characteristics of housing needs results in identification of two different categories of housing attributes in association with the different level of needs. Accordingly, primary levels of needs that associate with relatively tangible and concrete attributes are more likely to be content-specific and predictable. The higher levels of needs that associate with relatively complicated and abstract attributes are more likely to be problematical, confusing, and non-predictable.

Relationship between Acculturation Attitude and Effectiveness of Pragmatic Instruction

Attitude toward accepting target language culture or maintaining heritage culture referred to as acculturation attitude can determine language learners’ pragmatic gains during an educational sojourn. To this end, the current study investigated the relationship between language learners’ acculturation attitudes during an educational sojourn and the effectiveness of pragmatic instruction. Participants of the study were 52 Iranian postgraduate students of English education at a university in Australia. A discourse completion task was used to assess language learners’ level of pragmatic competence. The adapted version of Berry’s (2001) East Asian Acculturation Measure (EAAM) was also used to assess language learners’ level of acculturation attitude toward Australian culture. The analysis of Pearson product–moment correlation coefficient (r) revealed that there is a strong positive relationship between acculturation attitude and effectiveness of pragmatic instruction. The pedagogical implications of the findings suggested encouraging and providing opportunities for language learners who are on an educational sojourn to immerse in target language culture to be able to develop their pragmatic competence to an optimal level. Keywords: Acculturation Attitude, Pragmatic Competence, Pragmatic Instruction

Relationship between Acculturation Attitude and Translation of Culture-Bound Texts

&lt;p&gt;Acculturation attitudes, referred to as “sojourner reactions to adaptation into new language and cultural communities” (Culhane, 2004: 51), can be a predictor of translators’ level of intercultural competence during educational sojourns. Intercultural competence, defined as a “complex of abilities needed to perform effectively and appropriately when interacting with others who are linguistically and culturally different from oneself” (Fantini 2006: 12), can accordingly be a predictor of translation quality. To assess the actual relationship between acculturation attitude and quality of translation of culture-bound texts, the current study was conducted on 82 Iranian postgraduate students of Master of English translation at universities in England. The East Asian Acculturation Measure (EAAM), developed by Berry (2001), was adapted to assess translation students’ level of acculturation attitudes toward English culture. Some news excerpts adopted from the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) were also selected to assess the quality of translation of culture-bound texts. The analysis of Spearman rank order correlation (rho) revealed the significant positive relationship between acculturation attitude and quality of translation of culture-bound texts. The pedagogical implications of the findings suggested encouraging and providing language learners with opportunities to assimilate or integrate into the host country culture to be able to develop their intercultural competence to an optimal level.&lt;/p&gt;

Challenges of International Higher Education Students in a Foreign Country

Over the last several years, the number of international students attending colleges and universities in Malaysia has increased substantially. While the number of international students pursuing undergraduate and post graduate studies in Malaysian higher education institutions has increased, it is curious that some limitations and challenges exist to these students in their academic life. The main objective of this case study was to explore the challenges of Iranian students, as the largest group of international students in Malaysian higher education institutions. The research question formed in this study was: What challenges and difficulties do Iranian students face in Malaysian higher education institutions? Data were collected through semi-structured interviews of 21 Iranian postgraduate students pursuing their studies in both Malaysian public and private universities. Consistent with the result of previous studies, the following challenges were found: financial matters, visa, culture and insurance. The findings of the current study have useful implications for policy makers and managing bodies of educational institutions that seek to attract international students.

On The Use of English Collocations by Iranian Postgraduate Learners of ESP

Collocation is usually defined as two or more words which co-occur and must be learned as an integral whole. L2 learners should have a rich collocational competence to communicate effectively and fluently. Despite the importance of collocations in second language learning and teaching, no study has yet been carried out to investigate the Iranian postgraduate students` collocation knowledge of English for Specific Purposes (ESP). Therefore, this study explored the impact of type of test (receptive vs. productive) on the students` performance in collocation tests. Also, the collocation knowledge of the students was investigated across different fields of study and different collocation categories. For the purposes of this study, 100 ESP master students majoring in different fields of study were selected randomly from three national universities located in Yasouj and Isfahan provinces. The participants took a collocation test including a receptive multiple-choice test and a productive translation test. Both grammatical and lexical collocations were examined in the study. The results indicated that the participants had more difficulty with the productive test rather than the receptive test. Furthermore, the overall collocation knowledge of the students was significantly different across different fields of study and various collocation categories. It could be concluded that increasing knowledge of accurate collocational patterns, especially the productive collocation knowledge, is necessary for Iranian ESP postgraduate students.