Religious Identity Negotiation Among Iranian Migrants in Post-Migration Contexts: A Scoping Review Protocol

This registration presents a scoping review protocol developed prior to undertaking a study on religious identity among Iranian migrants. The objective of the review is to systematically map how migrants of Iranian origin experience and negotiate their religious identity after leaving Iran and settling in new sociocultural environments. Migration involves significant psychological, social, and cultural change (Berry, 2005). In this process, migrants may redefine and strategically negotiate various aspects of their identity, including their religious identity (Ward & Szabó, 2023). For Iranian migrants, identity negotiation can become a highly complex, emotionally and politically charged process. This process can be influenced by multiple factors, including the sociopolitical situation of both Iran and destination countries (Ahmadi et al., 2022), migrants’ ethnoreligious backgrounds (Bozorgmehr, 1998), and the dynamics of Iranian diaspora communities (Khayambashi, 2025). Although several studies have shed light on religious identity among Iranian migrants, the evidence remains scattered across disciplines such as psychology, sociology, anthropology, and other social science fields (e.g., Khayambashi, 2025; McAuliffe, 2008; Sadjed, 2017; Saghafi et al., 2012). Consequently, findings are fragmented and inconsistent, making it difficult to have a coherent understanding of how Iranian migrants navigate religious identity in post‑migration contexts. To date, no evidence synthesis has been conducted to bring this interdisciplinary body of literature together. What is currently known demonstrates considerable heterogeneity in how Iranian migrants relate to religion after migration. For instance, some Muslim‑born but secular Iranians distance themselves from Islam and instead emphasise cultural or pre‑Islamic Persian identity in diaspora settings (Cohen & Yefet, 2021; Gholami, 2014; Karimi & Bucerius, 2018; Khosravi, 2018; Mobasher, 2006). In contrast, devout Muslim Iranians may face challenges such as intra‑diaspora Islamophobia (Khayambashi, 2025) and pressure to soften or modify their religious expression in order to maintain a degree of inclusion within the broader Iranian community (Gholami, 2014). Iranian migrants from minority backgrounds, including Bahá’í, Jewish, or Armenian communities, often show distinct patterns of identity negotiation shaped by a history of suppression in their home country and minority status in both Iran and post-migration (Bozorgmehr, 1997). For instance, some Bahá’í Iranians actively maintain and prioritise their religious identity over other forms of social identification, such as cultural or national identity (Talebi & Desjardins, 2012). Similarly, some Jewish and Bahá’í Iranian migrants report being misperceived as Muslims in Western contexts and, as a result, may experience Islamophobia; to avoid such misidentification, they emphasise their actual religious/ethnic identities and avoid Middle Eastern or Iranian labels (Sadjed, 2017). The aim of this scoping review is therefore to systematically map the existing literature on religious identity among Iranian migrants and offer a more cohesive view of experiences across different ethnoreligious groups, post‑migration contexts, and destination countries. By mapping how religious identity is reported and examined across disciplines, this review will identify common themes, contextual factors, and gaps in current literature. The findings are expected to inform future research in migration studies, specifically theories on migrant identity, acculturation process, and intercultural relations in social and cross-cultural psychology.