Lived Experiences of Female Victims of Child Marriage

Child marriage is defined as marriage before reaching the age of 18. The present study aimed at studying the lived experiences of women who had been victims of child marriage in earlier stages of their lives. The data was collected through focused interviews with 12 women in Tehran. The twelve women, married in their childhood, were selected through the snowball method. Their experiences were collected through semi-structured interviews, rewritten and analyzed using the Colaizzi method. After the compilation of the interviews, twelve content points were extracted. The results showed that early marriage can be a positive factor in the incidence of domestic violence and dropping out of school. From the perspective of the marital relationship, child marriage can be one of the instances of sexual abuse of children. The majority of the victims are also mothers under the age of 18. Early marriage often leads to exploitation of women, including domestic work, rural work or employment outside the home. Poverty and economic factors, cultural factors and fear of disgrace have been the most important factors in the incidences of early marriage in the sample. Content extraction revealed that women face many problems in child marriage incidences. It seems that economic and cultural growth can act as a deterrent, but are not sufficient and it requires changes in attitudes, processes, culture and the law.