Sociological study of youth social capital in real world and cyberspace (Case study: Tabriz youth)

The concept of "social capital" has been the subject of many researches in the social sciences in recent years. It shows that the use of social virtual networks, including Facebook, is spreading among the younger generation and it has affected the human communication and interaction. Now, the present study aims to answer to the question that is there a relationship between social capital of individuals in cyberspace and the real world? The research method in this research is a survey and for measuring and collecting the data, a questionnaire tool was used. The statistical population of the study consists of young users of the social network (Facebook) in Tabriz in 2018. To do this, 300 people were selected as the sample size using the available and voluntary sampling method. Findings indicate that there is a direct relationship between the duration of Facebook membership, the amount of Facebook use and the level of participation and activity of users on Facebook and users' social capital in real and virtual space. Also, the findings show that there is a relationship between the social capital, social trust, social interaction, social support and the scope of communication network in the real world and cyberspace. In addition, social capital in cyberspace could explain 0.42 of the social capital variances in the real world.