WhatsApp in the lived experience of its users(Case Study: Tehrani young adults)

With increasing use of social media, including WhatsApp in various aspects of our life and the youth in particular in recent years, the impacts of such media on their users is the subject of the present study. The main focus of this research work is the impact of WhatsApp on young generation, however, the lived experience of the young adults and the meaning of using this social media for them as well as evaluation of the consequences of its use, have been so far left unnoticed. Such ignorance has taken place at the time that large group of users of WhatsApp and other social media in Iran are young adults. This research work is conducted based on a descriptive phenomenology method and has investigated the lived experience of young adults in using WhatsApp. The statistical population of the study consists of 10 Tehrani young adults.  The lived experience of those taken part in this study shows that WhatsApp for them, more than anything else, is making use of a new type of relation and that using this social media is not an option but a social need and necessity. Consequences of using WhatsApp in their understanding of this media, has been expressed in a dual emotion: An emotion that its scope, fluctuates from satisfaction to disatisfaction.