Objective: Fleeing from home in adolescence has become an increasing and serious
social problem all over the world. Most of the adolescents who choose to leave home,
have struggled with difficult and intolerable living conditions at home, however the
motives of fleeing from home are more distinct and victimogenic among the population
of adolescent girls.
This phenomenological study sets out to find and present the causes and consequences
of fleeing from home among the female residents of two Welfare crisis shelters in
Tehran, Iran. The overall aim of the study is to investigate the primary causes of fleeing
home, to develop a model for the whole phenomenon and to reflect the true stories and
the voices of the female help seekers in this group.
Method: In-depth interviews were carried out with 11 adolescent girls in Tehran who,
at the time of the interviews, were living at the Welfare Organization’s crisis shelters for
at least 24 hours. Participant observation and field notes were other research techniques
used in the study. The interviews were coded, by Open Code program, and later
categorized in relevant themes.
Findings: Family background and family composition were found to greatly influence
the decision of fleeing from home of these girls greatly. Histories of abuse, neglect and
maltreatment were reported by the girls who had problematic family relations and
complex family structures. Other finding of the study revealed high levels of street
victimization (sexual and physical abuse) and deviant behaviors (survival techniques
such as survival sex, drug and alcohol abuse) among the girls with longer periods of
living on the streets.
Conclusion: Girls coming from families with patriarchal and authoritarian rearing
patterns or from families with lax and permissive rearing patterns tend to flee from
home more often. The girls’ exposure to different types of abuse and neglect in such
families lead to non compliance of the girls with their families and also reaching to their
limits of tolerate at home. Extensive deviant behaviors and street victimization were
linked to disrupted family relations and disintegrated families among the girls with
longer periods of living on the street. A model was developed to explain the
phenomenon.