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Value (personal and cultural)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

|A personal and/or cultural value is an absolute or relative ethical value, the assumption of which can be the basis for ethical action.|

|A value system is a set of consistent values and measures. A principle value is a foundation upon which other values and measures of |

|integrity are based. Those values which are not physiologically determined and normally considered objective, such as a desire to avoid|

|physical pain, seek pleasure, etc., are considered subjective, vary across individuals and cultures and are in many ways aligned with |

|belief and belief systems. Types of values include ethical/moral values, doctrinal/ideological (religious, political) values, social |

|values, and aesthetic values. It is debated whether some values which aren't clearly physiologically determined are intrinsic such as |

|altruism and whether some such as acquisitiveness should be valued as vices or virtues. Values have typically been studied in |

|sociology; anthropology; social psychology; moral philosophy and business ethics. |

Personal values

Values are an integral part of every culture. with worldview and personality, they generate behavior. Being part of a culture that shares a common core set of values creates expectations and predictability without which a culture would disintegrate and its members would lose their personal identity and sense of worth. Values tell people what is good, beneficial, important, useful, beautiful, desirable, constructive...etc. They answer the question of why people do what they do. Values help people solve common human problems for survival. Over time, they become the roots of traditions that groups of people find important in their day-to-day lives.

Cultural values

The Inglehart-Welzel Cultural Map of the World, created by sociopolitical scientists Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel based on the World Values Survey.

Groups, societies, or cultures have values that are largely shared by their members. The values identify those objects, conditions or characteristics that members of the society consider important; that is, valuable. In the United States, for example, values might include material comfort, wealth, competition, individualism or religiosity . The values of a society can often be identified by noting which people receive honor or respect. In the US, for example, professional athletes at the top levels in some sports are honored (in the form of monetary payment) more than college professors. Surveys show that voters in the United States would be reluctant to elect an atheist as a president, suggesting that belief in God is a value. There is a difference between values clarification and cognitive moral education. Values clarification is, "helping people clarify what their lives are for and what is worth working for. Students are encouraged to define their own values and understand others' values."[1] Cognitive moral education is based on the belief that students should learn to value things like democracy and justice as their moral reasoning develops."[1]

Values are related to the norms of a culture, but they are more global and abstract than norms. Norms are rules for behavior in specific situations, while values identify what should be judged as good or evil. Flying the national flag on a holiday is a norm, but it reflects the value of patriotism. Wearing dark clothing and appearing solemn are normative behaviors at a funeral. In certain cultures they reflect the values of respect and support of friends and family. Different cultures reflect different values. "Over the last three decades, traditional-age college students have shown an increased interest in personal well-being and a decreased interest in the welfare of others."[1] Values seemed to have changed, affecting the beliefs, and attitudes of college students.

Members take part in a culture even if each member's personal values do not entirely agree with some of the normative values sanctioned in the culture. This reflects an individual's ability to synthesize and extract aspects valuable to them from the multiple subcultures they belong to.

If a group member expresses a value that is in serious conflict with the group's norms, the group's authority may carry out various ways of encouraging conformity or stigmatizing the non-conforming behavior of its members. For example, imprisonment can result from conflict with social norms that have been established as law.

References

1. ^ a b c Santrock, J.W. (2007). A Topical Approach to Life-Span Development. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill

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Norm (sociology)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Shaking hands after a sports match is an example of a social norm.

Social norms are the behavioral expectations and cues within a society or group. This sociological term has been defined as "the rules that a group uses for appropriate and inappropriate values, beliefs, attitudes and behaviors. These rules may be explicit or implicit. Failure to follow the rules can result in severe punishments, including exclusion from the group."[1] They have also been described as the "customary rules of behavior that coordinate our interactions with others."[2]

The social norms indicate the established and approved ways of doing things, of dress, of speech and of appearance. These vary and evolve not only through time but also vary from one age group to another and between social classes and social groups. What is deemed to be acceptable dress, speech or behavior in one social group may not be accepted in another.

Deference to the social norms maintains one's acceptance and popularity within a particular group; ignoring the social norms risks one becoming unacceptable, unpopular or even an outcast from a group. Social norms tend to be tacitly established and maintained through body language and non-verbal communication between people in their normal social discourse.

|We soon come to know when and where it is appropriate to say certain things, to use certain words, to discuss certain topics or wear |

|certain clothes, and when not to. Such knowledge about cultural norms is important for impression management,[3] which is an |

|individual's regulation of their nonverbal behaviour. We also come to know through experience what types of people we can and cannot |

|discuss certain topics with or wear certain types of dress around. Mostly this knowledge is derived experientially. |

Overview

Social norms can also be viewed as statements that regulate behavior and act as informal social controls. They are usually based in some degree of consensus and are maintained through social sanctions. Three models explain normative rule content:

• Focus on the actions of one's personal ego

• Focus on ego's reactions to actions of alternative

• Negotiation between ego and alternative.

Norms are rules of behavior. They exist as both formal and informal norms, but often the latter is found to be more strong and reinforced. These informal norms are divided into two:

• Folkways: Informal rules and norms whose violation is not offensive, but expected to be followed. It's a kind of adjusting, accommodating type of habits. It does not invite any punishment or sanctions, but some reprimands or warnings.

• Mores: They are also informal rules that are not written, but result in severe punishments and social sanction upon the individuals like social and religious exclusions.

Terms related to social norms

A descriptive norm refers to people's perceptions of what is commonly done in specific situations. An injunctive norm refers to people's perceptions of what is commonly approved or disapproved of within a particular culture.[4]

Prescriptive Norms are unwritten rules that are understood and followed by society. We do these every day with out thinking about them.

Proscriptive Norms are unwritten rules that are known by society that you shouldn't do, or follow. These norms can vary from culture to culture.

Deviance is "nonconformity to a set of norms that are accepted by a significant number of people in a community or society(Appelbaum, 173)." In simple terms it is behavior that goes against norms.

Looking Glass-Self is how we see ourselves by interacting with others, seeing how they perceive us, what others expect from us, and how we should behave.

Definitions of social norms

Norms in the context of Sociology "are principles or rules people are expected to observe; they represent the dos and don'ts of society (Appelbaum, 173)."

One might also say they are rules that define the behavior that is expected, required, or acceptable in particular circumstances. They are learned by interacting in society.

Examples of norms

Norms affect very much the way you behave in public. When you enter an elevator, it is expected that you turn around to face the doors. An example of a social norm violation would be to enter the elevator and remain facing the rest of the people.

Game-theoretical analysis of norm

A general formal framework that can be used to represent the essential elements of the social situation surrounding a norm is the repeated game of game theory.

A norm gives a person a rule of thumb for how they should behave. However, a rational person only acts according to the rule if it is optimal for them. The situation can be described as follows. A norm gives an expectation of how other people act in a given situation (macro). A person acts optimally given the expectation (micro). For a norm to be stable, people's actions must reconstitute the expectation without change (micro-macro feedback loop). A set of such correct stable expectations is known as a Nash equilibrium. Thus, a stable norm must constitute a Nash equilibrium.[5]

From a game theoretical point of view, there are two explanations for the vast variety of norms that exist throughout the world. One is the difference in games. Different parts of the world may give different environmental contexts and different people may have different values, which may result in a difference in games. The other is equilibrium selection not explicable by the game itself. Equilibrium selection is closely related to coordination. For a simple example, driving is common throughout the world, but in some countries people drive on the right and in other countries people drive on the left (see coordination game). A framework called comparative institutional analysis is proposed to deal with the game theoretical structural understanding of the variety of social norms.

References

1. ^ Steven N. Durlauf and Lawrence E. Blume (Eds), 'Social Norms' in New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, Second Edition, London: Macmillan, (forthcoming)

2. ^ Kamau, C. (2009) Strategising impression management in corporations: cultural knowledge as capital. In D. Harorimana (Ed) Cultural implications of knowledge sharing, management and transfer: identifying competitive advantage. Chapter 4. Information Science Reference. ISBN 978-1-60566-790-4

3. ^ Schultz, Nolan, Cialdini, Goldstein, Griskevicius. (2007). The constructive, destructive, and reconstructive power of social norms. Psychological Science 18 (5) pp 429–434

4. ^ Bicchieri, Cristina. 2006. The Grammar of Society: The Nature and Dynamics of Social Norms, New York: Cambridge University Press, Ch. 1

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