Predicting Attitudes Towards Extramarital Relationships based on Feelings of Loneliness and Interpersonal Forgiveness through the Use of Virtual Social Networks in Married Students of Ahvaz Azad University

The purpose of this research was to predict the attitude towards extramarital relationships based on feelings of loneliness and interpersonal forgiveness through the use of virtual social networks in married students of Ahvaz Azad University.

The research method was path analysis correlation. The statistical population included all married students of Ahvaz Azad University in the academic year of 2023. For this purpose, 240 people were selected by random sampling method. In order to collect data, the attitude questionnaires of Vitely (2006), feelings of loneliness by Russell, Pilova and Cortona (1980), interpersonal forgiveness by Ehtshamzadeh et al. Data analysis was done using descriptive and inferential statistics, Pearson correlation coefficient and path analysis (p<0.05).

The results showed that the coefficient of the path between loneliness and attitude towards extramarital relationships is β = 0.319, which is statistically significant at the p<0.01 level. The coefficient of the path between the feeling of loneliness and the use of virtual social networks is β=0.170, which is statistically significant at the level of p<0.05. The coefficient of the path between interpersonal forgiveness and attitude towards extramarital relations is β=0.074, which was not statistically significant at the level of p<0.05 and this path was removed. The path coefficient between interpersonal forgiveness and the amount of use of virtual social networks is β=0.364, which is statistically significant at the p<0.01 level. The coefficient of the path between the amount of use of virtual social networks and the attitude towards extramarital relationships is at the level of β = 0.430, which is statistically significant at the level of p < 0.01.

Therefore, it can be concluded that the feeling of loneliness and forgiveness and the amount of use of virtual social networks are among the variables related to the attitude towards marital relations, which require attention and investigation by the authorities, psychologists and family counselors.