The multilingual context of the present Iran has recently witnessed a significant tendency
among families in indigenous communities to undermine the mother tongue and speak the
official language of Persian to young children. Accordingly, the present study aimed at
examining the reasons for language shift from native to official among Dehlorani families in
Ilam, Iran. A questionnaire consisting of 46 items to identify the main reasons for language
shift was distributed among 206 participants to reflect their views on the basis of a five-point
Likert scale. The results indicated that the majority of people attributed language shift to
reasons such as the belief in better understanding of educational materials in school as well as
achieving fluency in Persian, the role of Persian as the lingua franca for all Iranian ethnics,
and the use of Persian in expanded domains. Moreover, the findings maintained that the
language shift is not confined to a particular social class but is pervasive among all members
of the society.