Analysis of Life Satisfaction and Tendency to Return of Afghan Immigrants Case Study: Razavi Khorasan Province

The history of immigration is not very clear but mankind has always been on the move and shift. Migration of Afghan people to Iran is migrating from a country to another country which is known as an international migration. The beginning of migration of Afghan people to Iran dates back to the times before the Iranian Islamic revolution in 1979. Occupation of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union's forces and that the subsequent civil wars, political instability, poverty and underdevelopment have led to the continuation of legal and illegal immigration of a large number of Afghani people to Iran and especially Razavi Khorasan province. Due to having border with Afghanistan, Razavi Khorasan province has been host to a large number of Afghan immigrants who reside in different parts of the province.
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK: There are many theories about immigration including: Lary Sjastad, Pull and Push theory, D. S.Thomas theory, and Everett S.Lee theory. Immigration of Afghan immigrants to Iran cannot be specifically linked to one of these theories and it is a combination of different theories. In addition, many researchers believe that, immigration of Afghan immigrants to other countries can be studied in the form of Pull and Push theory.
The aim of this study was to investigate life satisfaction and tendency to return of Afghan immigrants of Razavi Khorasan Province. The research method was descriptive – analysis, and PASW and GIS software’s were used for questionnaires analysis and mapping. Considering the large size of statistical population, Cochran formula was used to determine the sample size, so sample size was determined 350 persons. Questionnaires were distributed based on cluster sampling. Since more than 98% of Afghan immigrants live in the counties of Mashhad and Torbatejam, the aforementioned counties were selected as clusters of the sample society.
Population of Afghan immigrants of Razavi Khorasan province in 2011 was about 205,859 persons based on the statistical Centre of Iran. While, based on Amayesh No.9 plan (2013), the number of immigrants was about 135,862 persons. According to the level of life satisfaction of respondents in Iran, it was determined that, approximately 38% of respondents have low and very low levels of life satisfaction in Iran. 26% of the respondents have chosen high and very high levels of life satisfaction. According to Mann-Whitney test between the variables of gender and life satisfaction in Iran, the tendency of return to Afghanistan and having a sense of belonging to Iran, it was determined that there is a significant relationship between these variables since level of significance between variables of gender and life satisfaction is less than 0/05 But there is no significant relationship between tendency of return to Afghanistan and a sense of belonging to Iran because the level of significance between these variables is more than 0/05.
The results of the research showed that, the spatial distribution of Afghan immigrants in counties of Mashhad and Torbatejam is 98%. The results obtained from the questionnaire indicated that life satisfaction of Afghan immigrants of Razavi Khorasan Province is below the average of life, and tendency rate of return to Afghanistan was less than the average. Furthermore, according to the results of Mann-Whitney test, there are significant differences between the variables of respondents’ residence place, life satisfaction in Iran and tendency to return to their country between the two groups of respondents living in Mashhad and Torbatejam counties.