Educational Psychology for Everyone! -podcast, episode #4
Why values are important?
Guest: Dr. Florencia Sortheix, hosting Dr. Katja Upadyaya.
Transcript
00:00:08 Katja Upadyaya
Hello all, and welcome to listen to the Educational Psychology for Everyone! -podcast. My name is Katja Upadyaya and I will be your host today when we are discussing a very important topic: values.
So, if you think about values, values are important because they thatch each and every one of us. And often times we make decisions according to our values, even without thinking about them.
Doctor Florencia Sortheix has been doing research on values for several years, and today she is visiting our podcast and she will tell us more about values and recent research findings. Welcome Doctor Sortheix to Educational Psychology for Everyone!
00:00:52 Florencia Sortheix
Thank you Katja. Thank you for the invitation.
00:00:55 Katja Upadyaya
Thank you. So, I think we can start from the beginning. Could you tell us, what our values? How would you define them?
00:01:14 Florencia Sortheix
Yes, sure. So, I started to be interested in the topic of values for my PhD. So, before coming to Finland. And then I contacted the Professor Klaus Helkama, who was actually one of the pioneers who helped Shalom Schwartz develop his theory. So that’s one of the most widely used theories of values. And from there I can come to the definition that the values are broad goals that serve us as guidelines, actually. So, they guide our behavior and they also provide the motivation for their behavior. They also have a kind of evaluative component, so you judge things and people based on your values. Whether something’s good or interesting, it will depend on what things are most important to you.
00:01:54 Katja Upadyaya
Right. And so, we know already that there are quite many kinds of values, right? Could you tell us something about the kinds of values that exist, or that we have or?
00:02:06 Florencia Sortheix
Yeah… I will talk from Schwartz theory. So, Schwartz tested his theory in almost I think 70 countries of the world. It’s a massive amount of work and cross-cultural research to find out which values are common. So, this is not to say these are all the values that exist, but the values that we can measure more or less reliable across countries and cultures. And these 10 values. I will tell you the higher dimensions, so that we don’t have time to go over each of the 10 values.
Broadly, these values reflect the opposition between self-transcendence, which is caring for other people, the well-being of close people, and also the well-being of the broader society and the natural environment. So, transcendent self-interest versus and self enhancement value with concern personal interest, such as having power, having money, wealth, resources, showing achievements.
And the other dimension opposes openness to change versus conservation values. Openness to change and novelty seeking, being self-directing, choosing your own goals, happy experiencing new things, stimulating events. You like that change. And conservation values are people for whom it’s important to keep the status quo, keep things as they are, find security, respect the traditions, respecting the norms.
And why this opposition that I’m telling you? It’s actually, because people, when you ask them to write their values, if you tend to consider that openness to change values are important, you tend to consider that conservation are not important. So, this kind of opposition is present empirically in what people respond.
Another interesting thing is that across all samples and people, generally people value more self-transcendence and openness to change values than the self-enhancement and conservation values.
00:04:07 Katja Upadyaya
Hmm. So, those values are seeing are like the most important across the world?
00:04:14 Florencia Sortheix
Yes, there are differences, but in general it’s interesting to see that there is kind of a pancultural agreement that these values tend to be more, yes.
00:04:29 Katja Upadyaya
Right. And you also mentioned these are kind of like the main topics of values. So, are there kind of like some smaller kinds of values underneath them, or?
00:04:35 Florencia Sortheix
Yes. So, that these are the larger dimensions and there’s smaller values. Actually Schwartz developed his theory in 1992 and proposed 10 values. And then it was extended and even more smaller values were tested, and the structure works. And values are organized in a structure of these oppositions of values, which are more important than less important.
And interestingly, when you correlate values with other variables, they generally correlate positively with some values and negatively with the opposing values. So, something will correlate positively with self-sustain.
But going back to your question, sorry. The 10 values are benevolence, universalism, and the self-transcendence. And power and achievement are self-enhancement values.
And for the openness to change, you have self-direction, so choosing on goals, stimulation and hedonism, it is about enjoying life. And in the conservation values you have traditions, respecting the traditional institutions and the way society works. Conformity, which is about the obeying the norms and rules. And security. So those will be the 10 smaller values.
00:05:48 Katja Upadyaya
So, security, how would you define it?
00:05:51 Florencia Sortheix
Security is importance of personal and national security.
00:05:56 Katja Upadyaya
So, it does it also include kind of like stable income?
00:06:01 Florencia Sortheix
No, no, it doesn’t say anything about income. But if you want that, I can tell you what happened when… I’m maybe moving fast forward, but I tell you that one classification is about the self or the self-focus or other people focus. And another broader kind of underlying motivation is the growth motivations or the anxiety and self-protection motivation. So, security values, also with the power achievement values, are anxiety defending motivation. So, their main goal is to protect the self. So, you would say that if you don’t have money then you increase… There is not that you think, also research findings shows, that if you don’t have money or you live in poorer countries then you tend to give more importance to what you don’t have. Which is security, probably, money and possession.
If you live in a highly developed countries, as in Finland, then you people in general ascribe more importance to the anxiety-free, source to the growth values, which are self-enhancement, the care for the environment, for people.
So, I’m kind of like hearing that it kind of like matters also on in what kind of society you live in, and that what kind of values you would then have. So, it’s kind of like what is your situation also defines your values, a little bit at least.
It certainly allows you to focus more on to and give more importance to the growth values when you don’t feel that you are in danger, right, or in the scarce environment.
00:07:36 Katja Upadyaya
Yeah, right. So, then it might be also a little bit, I don’t know, this is just a thought, but it could be something similar also kind of like the Maslow’s hierarchy of values, in a way. So, when the basic needs are fulfilled, you move on, right?
00:07:58 Florencia Sortheix
Yes, exactly. And that’s, Maslow’s means it’s actually also at the basis of this thinking of growth and protection values, right. So, the protection values are about the basic need, exactly as you said, and the growth values are self-actualization.
And that leads to what in my research, I said, how are values linked to well-being? And it is partly, it’s what we would expect about the growth and anxiety free. So, those values related to growth, to satisfying the higher needs of self-actualization. And you know, developing yourself as the person are more connected to benevolence, universalism and also openness to change. And these values are positively related to your well-being.
While, if you focus on more on conservation or especially in self-enhancement on power and achievement, then your well-being is undermined. There is actually, the literature started by examining the role of power as a proxy for materialism. And in already in 1993, a lot of research was done, on the pervasive effects of the consumer culture on your well-being. And what happens when you think that you value these possessions and material. And it’s correlates impressively consistently with lower well-being, higher anxiety.
00:09:16 Katja Upadyaya
So, are you saying like if their materialistic values are very high, your well-being might not be so high?
00:09:23 Florencia Sortheix
Yes.
00:09:24 Katja Upadyaya
Hmm, that’s very interesting. And that’s really a good seat for thought, I think in the modern world, if we have so many things and so much material that we, that is easily available.
00:09:23 Florencia Sortheix
And so much messages. So, there is other research by Helga Dittmar and colleagues, which was so interesting about the messages that use and especially women are receiving. And how it so damages for their self-image and… Because people… So, that’s when we were walking here, you told me about the origins of value and I told you that yes, values are your inner compass. So, we are telling you from inside what should be important to you when you wait the consequences of any choice that you will make.
You say, “OK, what do I?” It’s not “What I care about?” It’s “What do I care more?” Because we care about many things at the same time. But what will I care a bit more? So, it’s the priority of values which is timing your behavior.
“I got the promotion, we need to move to another side of the world. What do I care more: benevolence, so taking care of my family. Or achievement, progress in my career?”
And then you decide, concern regarding many, many other aspects, but that’s at the core of the decision, right?
And our values are socialized very early on. So that takes us also to where do you live, what values you will value. So that they actually also sought as the intersection between the individual and society. So, we learn our values very early on from our family, from our society neighborhood, from the teachers. And then they are quite stable actually, through life and guiding us, and guiding us through many choices.
And that one part of my research has been on values and well-being. But the other part is on how values apply to the work context or how they guide your career choices.
00:11:28 Katja Upadyaya
So, can you really like teach values actively to children or students? Or how would you do it?
00:11:37 Florencia Sortheix
Yes, you can actually, kind of. We do teach values. Because at the university or in any school or learning environment we want people to think for themselves, that’s self-direction. To be curious, to be, to look for different options to do things, that’s stimulation values. So, the openness to change values are really reinforced by education.
But also nowadays we want more and more to teach universalism. How are we going to maintain the society like a well-functioning and integrated society which does not destroy the environment? And I think it’s part of also the University of Helsinki, one of the core values now is sustainability, which is all about universalism. How can we keep this value and transmit this value? Through education, through role modeling, of course, but also through books, stories, anecdotes.
Values, when we talk about values of the group, we talk about cultural values, our group values, and they are seeing in also in the heroes that we have. Who are the role models and that we give the children, and those kind of things are transmitting values.
00:12:57 Katja Upadyaya
Right. That’s very interesting. But then if you go a little bit back for considering the culture, you mentioned that these values are seen across the cultures and across the world. But then I was wondering, if there are any differences in these values? We touched that topic a little bit, but in general are they, what kind of findings there are?
00:13:14 Florencia Sortheix
Yes. So, when you are aggregate the values of a country, like Finland, you’ll find very clear, very clear map of the world. One work is done by Schwartz. So, following the Schwartz values then we know we have that, it changes with the names of the values because it’s aggregated and it changes the value structure, but it’s about egalitarianism.
So, Finland and all the Nordic countries are very high on egalitarianism and autonomy, intellectual autonomy thinking by them, and you can see those in the educational system.
Because egalitarianism will oppose the value of hierarchy. Hierarchy will be that there is very much respect for the professor and you will never refer to a professor by the name or anything like that. And this is very high in confusion in Asian countries, for example. Also in African countries. Latin America is a bit in the middle of this hierarchy and equalitarianism.
And then embeddedness is also very high in this more Asian countries. And also former, here we have Eastern European countries with higher more on this embeddedness and collectivistic values, which are related to conservation values.
00:14:45 Katja Upadyaya
Right. And then also in the Nordic countries and also here in Finland, we value things like nature and kind of like the purity of nature a lot. Where would you relate that kind of value?
00:14:57 Florencia Sortheix
Yes, because I know it, I forgot. It’s not only about egalitarianism, but it’s harmony, is the cultural value harmony with nature and inner peace. Imagine, it’s an item that loads into harmony. Finland of course is the highest in, one of the highest in harmony.
And the country score on harmony predicts their footprint, actually. How much this country… Many, well, some sustainability outcomes.
And then you can, see when I was teaching, I was teaching a course that was called Introduction to Finnish culture and society. So, I said, where do you see the harmony? And people, we were looking for examples together and one was for example in laws here. You have the law of the every man’s right. That’s impressive, because that shows that the land is the natures for everyone to ensure that you cannot put the fence preventing people to go to the sea. Yeah, and that doesn’t exist in other countries. You live by the sea. You put a huge fence so that you have it for yourself. So that shows that this has been happening in history for a long time, this harmony and the value of nature for all. Because they have to do, but also with for everyone.
Then the inner peace, and then also being in nature with the “mökki”. The culture being just alone in your mökki and just, you don’t want anyone around. Just you and nature, right?
And then in current practices, like for example the government build the “baana”. I don’t know if I’m pronouncing it right, but it’s this is lane for bikes. They could have made a shopping mall, but they built the baana. And probably citizens have the saying there, right? So, we want to transport also in something that is more, not contaminating, respecting nature.
00:16:53 Katja Upadyaya
Right. Oh, that’s very interesting when you talk about it, and also about the harmony. Maybe that explains why Finland is also ranking so high in the happiness after year after year? We are always at the top of the happiness, happiest country in the world. So, I’m wondering if the harmony has something to do with it because it seems that we have also maybe like a really good work – life balance compared to many other countries.
00:17:19 Florencia Sortheix
Yes.
00:17:20 Katja Upadyaya
So maybe that also reflects the values over here?
00:17:24 Florencia Sortheix
Yes, I’m not now remembering very well about the research, but I’m sure it does. At least, of course, if you think about universalism. That when it’s high and you are in a country which allows you to kind of live in line with your universalism values. Then you have the highest working.
That was my one finding of my research, that if you live in a highly developed country and you value universalism, it’s positive for your well-being.
But you’re living a low developed country, and you value universalism, you are unhappy. Because we theorize is that you cannot live up to your values, right? Because you feel so many frustrations, inequality, lack of contact with nature and lack of opportunities for everyone, etcetera.
00:18:18 Katja Upadyaya
So there has to be kind of like a fit between the environment and…
00:18:20 Florencia Sortheix
Yeah, fit. So I think that what we find in Finland and in the Nordics that they all score among the highest in happiness is the match that people with the – I call it the good values. Can we call it the good values? – But with the universally harmony values and benevolence values and egalitarian, can live and have society that fit these values, then they score the happiest.
00:18:49 Katja Upadyaya
Right. If you think about value research, is there some values that are kind of like lacking here in Finland, such as like respect to elders? It’s not maybe as strong as in some other countries, or?
00:19:04 Florencia Sortheix
I don’t know if lacking but, but of course the conservation values are much lower. And maybe they also have their positive side. Conservation values are about the traditional institutions and respected statue. It doesn’t mean that no one in Finland values them.
00:19:24 Katja Upadyaya
Right.
00:19:25 Florencia Sortheix
We always have to remember that there are different people in every country. So even when we talk about the generalized, general idea of what values are valued in Finland it’s absolutely not everyone. The difference are larger inside Finland actually that if you compare Finland with another country. But just when we aggregate, we see these expressions of values at the group level.
And then, and maybe societies that have a bit higher these more collective and conservative values are a bit more oriented towards sharing your time with groups at the expense of personal freedom. And maybe this trade off in Finland is not happening so much that maybe there is so much emphasis on individualism that those values suffer a bit more in a way.
And yes, there are consequences. There are groups that are suffering a lot of loneliness.
00:20:25 Katja Upadyaya
Right. Because then I’m kind of like wondering if there’s some sort of like a value balance that would be the best so that it can be find, or does it even exist? Or can there be like many kinds of combinations that?
00:20:50 Florencia Sortheix
No, I think that we will go back to the individuals, the each person has its own balance. And there are probably moments in life where different values will produce, give you the most happiness. And it will change. But I think the congruence again with what you value, what you do is important, and that’s at the individual level and it’s not a balance. It’s what you choose and how you organize your life to match what you value.
00:21:14 Katja Upadyaya
Right. And then you said something about values being quite stable. Like that they kind of like start developing early on in your life. But is it possible to change values? Or if you would want to change them, or do they change? Are there some indicators that push them to change or, what do you think?
00:21:37 Florencia Sortheix
I’m thinking, I don’t… The first thought that I have is that values are, do change a little bit and for at least temporarily, when there is a crisis. And that’s, there has been a lot of research now. I did my one study actually with Schwartz also himself and others, about the economic recession in 2008. So now we can think that probably something similar is happening nowadays.
And in 2008, there was a big bump in values because those self-protection values, the anxiety protection values increased. So, power, achievement and also security, increased in importance for young people. So, we took actually people from 18 to 35 years old from all European countries. And this increase was much more, much higher in lower, less socioeconomic developed countries. And it was a bit smaller in countries which have a larger welfare system, like Finland. But still, it was. And it lasted at least one or two rounds, because we use European Social Survey data, so it lasted some years. And that has consequences. Because we know that those values in general decrease well-being, increase anxiety. These values are also related to negative attitudes towards outgroup members, towards immigrants. Are positive related to vote in a right-wing government. So, I think that we are seeing something in those lines. But then these values came back to normality, so it was temporary.
And in longitudinal study with individual people – because that was a cross time series, we see that values change very little. So even though you have something in there, maybe a small change, but then you get back to what you know, what your previous levels, and they guide you very stable. It’s called self-selection. So you, individual for example who values certain things self-select themselves to certain occupations.
00:23:40 Katja Upadyaya
But then crisis, like the climate change, this is going on now. Do you think it has more lasting effect on values?
00:23:49 Florencia Sortheix
The climate change is kind of different because it doesn’t not only affect our resources or our security, you know… It’s wider. So, it affects more your kind of, your universalism values are challenged.
So, we cannot kind of test the effect because this has been happening for a long time. Now we are more and more, every year more aware. But the information has been there since the 70s, I think. It’s not so, not a shock. So, when there is a shock it’s easy to see the effect. But this long time… I hope that actually talking about the environment and kind of bringing the importance of this value to awareness increase importance of protecting.
00:24:34 Katja Upadyaya
Right. And then at the individual level it’s very interesting to think that we usually think that we have own values. Somethings are important for us, some are not. But then that’s also the reflection of the society and what’s going around you, right. So, it’s not just, it’s actually not very individual, at all. It’s all the situation, everything effects how you think. And I think that’s a that’s a very important message too. So, we are kind of a part of the bigger picture what’s going on, yeah.
00:25:09 Florencia Sortheix
And I think that’s a very important message for educators to also teach young people like to get in touch with their values. Because values can be kind of brought to awareness, reflect on value, on their values. And contractive it also there so much messages that we have, we have all the consumer campaigns. Of course trying to get our attention on what we should want, how we should live our lives. And how women should look like. Then we have the political also, disputes here and there. What we should value, or not value. So, there are a lot of conflicting views that can be very confusing, I guess, for youth.
00:25:55 Katja Upadyaya
Yeah, a lot of messages coming from each direction, right. So maybe, should we then kind of like teach young people sort of like inner strength? Or kind of like, don’t follow everything?
00:26:05 Florencia Sortheix
I think that reflecting on your own values give you a lot of inner strength, yes.
But it can be difficult, of course, because then some people, especially young people, can get confused. Is it what I value what others value? So, this differentiation of the self and other expectation is part of the development. Reflecting on values can help.
00:26:33 Katja Upadyaya
And then, I know you already mentioned some resource findings, but are there some other research findings that you had in your own career that you would want to share with us? I know you have done a lot of research from kind of like different perspectives, or also on values?
00:26:50 Florencia Sortheix
Yeah. So, I have mostly talked now about general values and well-being and how the context might influence, also which values. And then another part of my research has studied values in the work context.
So, work values or career values are the type of things that you consider important to have or to do in your job or in your future job.
And that leads your career selection. And then we talk about bit different values. Because it can also be about novelty, new things. But also how important is for you to have management tasks in innovative, innovation in the work. How important is to have a good social relationships with coworkers, the work – life balance, value, etcetera.
And then we have studied, OK, these values predict some career choices like entrepreneurship or leadership.
But one important like take away message for all, is that when there were some values that are called – this is following more research on by Jeylan Mortimer and Monica Kirkpatrick Johnson from the US. When there is this intrinsic work values, is “I want this job because I find it interesting. I really like it. It’s valuable, it’s worth it itself, for me”. When you have this intrinsic appreciation of the choice that you’re making. Then this predicts your work engagement even four or six years afterwards. So, it has kind of this very protective effect.
And another, if we think about another predictor of being work engaged and not, and preventing you from being burnout, if the person – shop fit. So, this comes from Maslach’s areas of work life. So, one very important predictor is, how much your values are aligned with your organizational values.
And then again, so for all their students who are thinking about what the career choices, thinking about really, what is what I value, and where will I work? I need an alignment or not, when there is a choice. Because, sometimes… but that’s a very important step. Because otherwise, when you feel this misfit, it generates so much anxiety and you’re kind of betraying yourself.
00:29:11 Katja Upadyaya
Right. That’s very important message for other students who are who are entering to the work life. Yeah.
00:29:20 Florencia Sortheix
And also for workplaces, for example, in teacher education, I remember I was teaching a course and the students were asking why do young kindergarten teachers leave the workplace? Because apparently there is a huge problem. Not only that there are not enough, but also those who go there early on, quit. And when they were interviewing people, they said is the lack of value fit because we cannot work in line with our values. So, also not that the workplace wouldn’t have these values, but if there are constraints like a lot of bad distribution of workload.
00:30:00 Katja Upadyaya
Right. These are very interesting results you are sharing, thank you.
Then I was thinking, you know this field quite well. Do you think there are still some research gaps in the field of values and value research, and what should we focus on next and? Or what are you going to focus on next? Do you have some plans?
00:30:19 Florencia Sortheix
I don’t know but it’s interesting to see that the from different angles, they are always coming to the same thing which is values in action.
And it’s curious because it’s something so basic and so simple. How do we act, lying with our values.
But imagine, from psychotherapy, act therapy, which it’s a branch of cognitive behavioral therapies, acceptance and commitment therapy. It’s all about values.
So, you go to therapy and then it’s all, it’s very central and core part of to identify your values to see where you are acting in line or not.
From sustainability, research. So, we know that people care about the environment, but they don’t always act in line with that. A lot of research done. How can we enable people with the sustainable values, which are about harmony and universalism, also open to, to act upon them? To not just follow the trend and continue contaminating and consuming, to be more aware.
And in value research, there has been very recent study published about an intervention to promote living in line with values. Value enactment was the intervention and they compared it to mindfulness, which has already been tested so many times in relation to well-being. And this intervention which was about bringing your values to awareness and trying to find ways to live more in line was as effective as the mindfulness.
00:31:54 Katja Upadyaya
Hmm, right.
00:31:56 Florencia Sortheix
And, well, mindfulness can also be applied in the classroom, but this one can also be applied in classroom and in, yes, by counselors and.
So, I think that line of research, I would like to pursue.
00:32:05 Katja Upadyaya
Values in action. Yeah. That sounds very interesting and very important too, for the future to understand it better.
So, we come to the end of the interview and I’m still wondering, would you have any practical advice for teachers and parents and also the future teachers who might be listening to this podcast, how to kind of like embrace values or how to find your own values and also identify them? And also how to support the young people’s values to develop?
00:32:49 Florencia Sortheix
There are a lot, several questionnaires in the Internet. So, resources are available there of many, many different sorts of value questionnaire that students, or your children can even fill in. Or even a parent and a child can talk together, like what do you think about this and that. And maybe we don’t ever question like how important is for you a world at peace or something, And maybe it’s something so simple, but something so central to learn that we don’t question. And starting to questioning, will be really nice.
But of course, no one can say like you have to teach everyone this value. All values are valuable. But yeah, it’s important to at least try to know what our kids value. And the ways to support them is to make them aware of what things they value. Then you’re supporting them to act on those values.
And also, it maybe clarifies what expectation the father have for, and the teacher have for their children. Because maybe they think that everything is about achievement and performance and getting good grades and being great in this and that. And then it’s OK, some parent can clarify. “Oh no! For me, it’s actually more important. Look, taking care of nature and being helping toward the neighbor.” So, it clarifies also expectations or values of the other people.
People tend to think that the other people value less self- and transcendent values. There’s benevolence universally when people really do. We have this yes, mismatch.
00:34:34 Katja Upadyaya
That’s very interesting. Now I know what we will talk about in the dinner table with my family tonight. OK. Thank you. Thank you, Florencia for this inspiring and very interesting interview. And thank you for sharing your insights with us.
00:34:54 Florencia Sortheix
Thank you very much for inviting me, Katja. It was very interesting experience.
00:35:00 Katja Upadyaya
Thank you. Bye bye!