This paper probes the different adjustment patterns of Iranian university students to the contemporary social and political scene and the degree to which they accept or reject the dominant cultural mores, traditional values, and the institutionalized authority of the society. Two patterns of adjustment are distinguished: the alienated activist who is politically and socially active, and the passive retreatist who is not likely to participate in social and political activities. The paper further examines two groups of active and passive students to highlight their differences and similarities. A total of 243 subjects have been drawn from university students in Tehran through a disproportionately stratified sampling. Using structured interviews and focused group discussions, detailed information about social, economic, and demographic backgrounds as well as information on the attitudes, ideations and behaviors of respondents has been collected. In order to measure different psychosocial dimensions of the subjects’ behaviors and attitudes related to alienation and activism, 24 scales are utilized. Two-tailed Student’s t-Test for continuous variables and chi-square analysis for categorical variables are used to compare the two groups. Results indicate that the two groups do not differ by age, marital status, level of education, and the degree of social and political alienation. However, the groups significantly differ in terms of several background variables and some attitudinal and behavioral characteristics. The activists and passive retreatist differed by gender, socioeconomic status, residency, field of study, employment rate, grade point average, membership in organizations, degree of exposure to mass media, and group size. The difference between the two groups was also statistically significant in terms of political ideology, family structure, self- efficacy, need to achievement, self-estrangement, reformism, rebelliousness,
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