The examination of taking off headscarf behaviour in the light of the cognitive dissonance theory and secularization theory

Abstract

Wearing a headscarf is not only a personal worship but it is related to social, cultural, and political experiences. Therefore, wearing or taking off a headscarf may not be a free decision of an individual. This study tries to find some answers to how women eliminate their cognitive dissonances in the process of taking off headscarf considering its links with social, cultural, and political experiences. In this study, 63 online letters that were published on the "yalnizyurumeyeceksin.com" website between 01.01.2020 and 01.03.2020 are chosen to be the sample. I applied content analysis to these documents. In the light of this analysis, I found that the dissonance between not wanting to wear the headscarf (1(st) cognition) and being hijabi (2(nd) cognition) can be a reason for a series of disturbances from discontentment to depression. As a result, to eliminate this dissonance, the individuals may try to use these methods to reduce the dissonance: secularizing both with the clothes and the style of living (adding supportive cognition), alienating from the World (reducing the dissonance), describing religious life of their own family inadequate (adding supporting cognitions), emphasizing family's oppressive attitudes (reducing the dissonance), getting economic independence (adding supportive cognition), having a separate house from family (adding supportive cognition) and, confirming that they do not perform other religious obligations either (adding supportive cognition). One of our findings is that some individuals not only change their attitude about headscarves but also experience the conversion. Another prominent theme in the findings is some women start to feel that they do not belong the group that headscarf implies they belong to. Besides this, some of them take off their headscarves because they start to think that it is excessively hard to wear.