Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theory

Personal values have been shown to shape consequential social beliefs and behaviors in cultures around the world, but relatively little is known about how they develop. Schwartz argues that personal values form as individuals are exposed to social institutions which are themselves informed by cultur...

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Main Authors: Andrew Miles, Catherine Yeh
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2022-01-01
Series:Social Sciences and Humanities Open
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291122000183
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author Andrew Miles
Catherine Yeh
author_facet Andrew Miles
Catherine Yeh
author_sort Andrew Miles
collection DOAJ
description Personal values have been shown to shape consequential social beliefs and behaviors in cultures around the world, but relatively little is known about how they develop. Schwartz argues that personal values form as individuals are exposed to social institutions which are themselves informed by cultural values and other macro-level forces. An important but largely unexamined implication of this theory is that nominally similar social categories such as gender or religion will have different effects in different countries because context-sensitive institutions will imbue them with context-specific meanings. We test this claim using eight independent, nationally representative samples that collectively include 32 European countries (total N = 374,729). We find that most relationships between social categories and personal values vary across countries. Further, country-specific effects are patterned by cultural regions, supporting the idea that similarities in macro-level influences lead to similarities in how social institutions shape personal values. These results are consistent with Schwartz's theory. Practically, they suggest that efforts to understand value development should be sensitive the particulars of specific environments.
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spelling doaj.art-b1f73ae06dcd4764a61eaf73d203a1952022-12-21T21:23:23ZengElsevierSocial Sciences and Humanities Open2590-29112022-01-0151100264Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theoryAndrew Miles0Catherine Yeh1Corresponding author.; Department of Sociology, University of Toronto, 725 Spadina Ave, Toronto, ON M5S 2J4, CanadaDepartment of Sociology, University of Toronto, 725 Spadina Ave, Toronto, ON M5S 2J4, CanadaPersonal values have been shown to shape consequential social beliefs and behaviors in cultures around the world, but relatively little is known about how they develop. Schwartz argues that personal values form as individuals are exposed to social institutions which are themselves informed by cultural values and other macro-level forces. An important but largely unexamined implication of this theory is that nominally similar social categories such as gender or religion will have different effects in different countries because context-sensitive institutions will imbue them with context-specific meanings. We test this claim using eight independent, nationally representative samples that collectively include 32 European countries (total N = 374,729). We find that most relationships between social categories and personal values vary across countries. Further, country-specific effects are patterned by cultural regions, supporting the idea that similarities in macro-level influences lead to similarities in how social institutions shape personal values. These results are consistent with Schwartz's theory. Practically, they suggest that efforts to understand value development should be sensitive the particulars of specific environments.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291122000183Personal valuesCultural valuesCultural zonesValue developmentContext effectsCross-national variation
spellingShingle Andrew Miles
Catherine Yeh
Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theory
Social Sciences and Humanities Open
Personal values
Cultural values
Cultural zones
Value development
Context effects
Cross-national variation
title Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theory
title_full Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theory
title_fullStr Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theory
title_full_unstemmed Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theory
title_short Do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context? A test of Schwartz's value development theory
title_sort do demographic predictors of personal values vary by context a test of schwartz s value development theory
topic Personal values
Cultural values
Cultural zones
Value development
Context effects
Cross-national variation
url http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291122000183
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