Sociological Explanation of Women's Participation Affecting Factors in Public Sports in Gorgan

The aim of this study was to explain the sociology of factors affecting women's participation in public sports in Gorgan. This research was a qualitative in which the Grounded Theory method was used. The statistical population of this study included elite female athletes, coaches and experts in the field of public sports, specialists and professors of physical education and sports sciences. Using snowball sampling method, 15 individuals were selected as the sample. In order to ensure the reliability of the obtained data, two methods of retest reliability and intercoder reliability were applied. Data analysis was performed in three stages of open coding, axial coding and selective coding. Based on the analysis, 46 open codes were extracted, which were classified into 5 categories (subcategories): personal barriers, family barriers, facilities and economic barriers, cultural barriers and social barriers. According to the results, it could be concluded that part of the barriers to women's participation in public sports were related to personal factors and the other part was related to environmental and social factors. It is suggested that by increasing women's awareness about the benefits of physical activity and also removing some cultural, environmental and social barriers, the necessary ground for women to participate more in public sports should be provided.