Social Perception of Time and the Factors that Shape It

Studying the perception of time in everyday life of Iranian actors is the purpose of this article. Sociological studying makes the basis of our analysis of time. Thus، we believe that the perception of time and the way the actors face it in their everyday life are formed socially and take different patterns in social interactions. The main purpose of this paper is to present a sociological analysis about one of the everyday life realities، “the perception of time” or more precisely “the awareness” that exists around the time in everyday life and conducts their actions. The grounded theory was used for this research and the research samples were chosen from among urban and rural men and women. The research findingd indicated the “fluidity of time perception” and that the perception of time like other knowledge categories has horizon or background by which individuals confirm it. The findings confirm that benefiting of such fields as urban or rural، or living in society with special stage of development makes special kind of awareness about time acceptable for individuals who expose to it. The gender creates different cognition over time and leads men and women to have more coexistence with specific dimentions of time. Also the actors see such variations different with respect to the specific way of living، life cycle social roles and social disorders. Under these conditions، they choose special strategies for controlling and managing the time; delaying and scrutinizing strategies are the most important of them.