Implicit theories of wisdom in Iran: A phenomenological study

In this study, the implicit theories of wisdom -that is lay people's views on wisdom- were addressed. The present study was conducted in terms of qualitative approach and phenomenological type, and the instrument used to collect the data was structured interview with which 92 subjects were interviewed. Participants’ mean age was 42.66 year and ranged between 20 and 78 years. Interviews, with permission of the participants, were recorded and transcribed on paper and were analyzed using Colaizzi method. Results showed that based on people’s definition of wisdom, 5 basic concepts can be extracted as the components of wisdom which include cognition, empathy/support, knowledge/flexibility, self-determination/self-expression, and religiousness. Results indicated that participants introduced father more (in family level) as the wise person who has been influential in their life, and in the next orders mother and close relatives got the largest percentage, suggesting that most of the people identified as wise were in the family class. Results indicated that the characteristics of and reasons for being wise can be classified into seven categories (personality characteristics, communication, leadership, thinking, knowledge, religiousness, and family). Thus, people's views on the concepts of wise and wisdom affect various aspects of their life and how they think and behave when facing life events.