The Phenomenology of lived Experiences Of Women Over 35 Years of Age Who Have Never Married In Tehran

The purpose of this research is to study the never married women’s attitudes and feelings towards bachelorhood, and their experience of single life. Findings were obtained through in-depth phenomenologically-oriented interviews with fifteen unmarried women from Tehran.
Ambivalent feelings is one of the main themes derived from the interviews; on one hand women feel free, liberated, and satisfied; on the other hand they are infused with a sense of emotional deficiency not recommending this kind of life style. According to what participants mentioned in their interviews, we distinguished abstract and objective independency from each other. Partial identity is another category emerged from interviews, which includes the themes of incomplete identity and unrealized sexual identity.