The Role Parents Play in Transmission Values and Meanings to Their Children

In many research studies, it has been pointed out that parents are effective in raising their children. Parents have always sought to transfer their lives’ values and meanings to their children. But, in the literature of Persian research, there has not been an in-depth study of the way this effect has been done. The present study aimed to analyze how parents play this role through a qualitative research method and an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA). To this end, a semi-structured interview was conducted with ten parents of Iranian families. Moreover, data analysis was carried out by Smith’s IPA. The analyses’ results led to two main themes (i.e., “Different strategies of parents to transmit values and meanings to children” and “Affectability of transmission strategies”). Furthermore, the sub-themes included "transmission through verbal and non-verbal behavior", "relationship control as a strategy", "control of the environment as a strategy", "effect of parents’ trust in children in strategy selection", "effect of parents’ personal experience about their parents", "effect of children personality differences in strategy selection", "effect of gradual changes in parents personalities in strategy selection", "effect of child’s developmental stage in strategy selection", "effect of psychological teachings in strategy selection", "parental discord in strategy selection", and "effectiveness of importance of a value in strategy selection". This study’s results revealed that the process of transferring values and the meaning of life was influenced by the content the parents intended to transfer; moreover, the parents’ strategies in the path of transfer were affected by various factors, from the parents’ inner thoughts to the children-related variables.