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Attitudes toward War in the United States and Iran

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Saba Torabian  and
Marina Abalakina
Saba Torabian
Affiliation:
University of California Davis
Marina Abalakina
Affiliation:
San Francisco State University
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Abstract

Understanding the determinants of attitudes toward war is important for the prevention of military conflicts and the promotion of peaceful conflict resolution. To examine American and Iranian attitudes toward war, questionnaires were administered to American and Iranian college students in the United States and Iran respectively. The results of the study revealed that American students generally have more positive attitudes toward war than Iranian students. Since most Iranians in the sample experienced eight years of war with Iraq whereas Americans never had direct experience of war, it was predicted that direct experiences of military action could explain this cross-national difference. Among Iranians those who experienced the Iran–Iraq war had more negative attitudes toward war compared to Iranians who did not have such experiences. The results further demonstrated that being authoritarian, religious and male were independently related to having positive attitudes toward war in both samples.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 45 , Issue 4 , June 2012 , pp. 463 - 478
Copyright
Copyright © The International Society for Iranian Studies 2012

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Footnotes

This study was conducted by Saba Torabian while she was pursuing her Master's degree at San Francisco State University. We would like to express our gratitude to Farideh Jomehri for her help and support in collecting data in Iran.

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