This paper is largely based on my field works in Iran from 1994 to 2004 and combines qualitative and quantitative methods. I conducted my first qualitative survey (open-ended interviews with a sample of a hundred mothers) in Tehran, Isfahan and their poor suburbs from 1994 to 2000. The quantitative survey, which is a result of the collaboration between Monde Iranien (CNRS), the French Research Institute in Iran and the Statistical Center of Iran was conducted in 2002 with a sample of 6,960 urban and rural households in all twenty-eight provinces. The sample was composed of 30,714 individuals, including 7,633 women 15 years and older married at least once, and 6,154 single youth, 15–29 years old, who lived with their parents: 3,437 boys and 2,717 girls.