Investigating the role of Instagram social network in gender awareness

Social networks (media) are changing the role of audiences. These networks have been able to turn readers who read only the story of a film or its maximum critique into content producers. The interactive feature of social media allows readers to share their opinions. Users' perceptions of topics can change due to the conversation they engage with on social media. The term social media was first coined by Barnes in 1954 and has since quickly become a keyword in research and study. In traditional social network theory, a social network is a set of social institutions that include people and organizations that are interconnected by a set of meaningful social relationships and interact to share values. Social networking services today are more focused on the online virtual community.

In the current Iranian society, Instagram has a large audience due to the lack of filters. In 1996, after Telegram, it has the highest level of interest of Iranian users (ISPA 2017). The Statista website also reported that the number of Iranian Instagram users is about 24 million. In other words, about 32% of Internet users in Iran are also active on Instagram. This number of users means that 30% of the Iranian population uses Instagram. According to the statistics provided in Bazaar Cafe, which is a store dedicated to applications or mobile applications in Iran, Instagram has been downloaded more than 18 million times from this software in Iran. Of course, the number of Instagram users is more than this amount because this application can be downloaded from other spaces such as Apple App Store and Google Play Store. Instagram is a space where women from different groups with different educations can produce content, comment, and talk about their issues with others. It is therefore an opportunity for women to explore the messages produced in this space and analyze it from various angles, providing information about what is happening in it. Given the importance and position of women in various roles and the growing trend of women using social networks, the present study studies the role of Instagram social networks in promoting gender awareness among users of this space. So far, no research has been done in this field in Iran, so it seems necessary to examine the role of Instagram's social network in promoting gender awareness among its users.