Human Behavior > The Role of Values in our Lives
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The Role of Values in our LivesThe Role of Values in our Lives
In general it can be said that our lives are focussed entirely on the things which are valuable to us. Reflections on just what those things are - the things that give meaning to our lives -- lead us to the development of a value system.
These values have an impact on all our actions. If the concept of "values" is viewed from a psychological perspective it can be defined as a long term (permanent) intra-psychical interaction structure according to which specific behavior or objectives are evaluated as preferable to other/antithetical behavior or objectives. In this respect our values are a stable structuring of our relationship to specific behavior and objectives compared to dissimilar potential behavior and objectives. As such they determine our preferences and priorities regarding that which is right. This involves not merely a preference. It pertains to the preferences. The Prescriptive Nature of Values. Values prescribe to us how we should conduct ourselves. This relates to the kind of behavior that, from an objective viewpoint, is expected of us - the correct or right behavior. Not all values have the same prescriptive character. Instrumental values have more of a prescriptive quality than terminal values -- especially where it concerns normal values. The truth is that different values exert different amounts of pressure on the individual to act in a certain manner and to determine his or her objectives and priorities in a particular way. Therefore we can say with conviction that values often operate as norms or laws in our lives and serve as guidelines in the assessing and evaluation of our behavior. Our conscience often functions with the human system of values as basis. This means that conscience can also be activated by values derived from the cultural-social milieu. The believer may therefore find him- or herself harboring feelings of guilt that he or she ascribes to some imagined sin, while in reality those guilt feelings have nothing to do with sin. It is for this reason that the internalisation of values constitutes the fundament for the functioning of a healthy conscience. The humanist philosophy acknowledges no absolute values, no objective assessment of behaviour. Each person decides individually what is right for him or her. The one person can also not prescribe to another how to lead his or her life. The only motive for building up a set of values which induces a certain style of behavior is the fact that man is a social entity. Group pressure obliges him to adhere to particular values. Nevertheless, the individual need not subject him or herself to guilt feelings when he or she has contravened these community values. Indeed, he or she can find peace of mind in the knowledge of having confirmed his or her individuality by way of that very contravention. Any attempt to prescribe objective values to someone is seen, from this perspective, as indoctrination - as something that may weaken the individual's mental health by generating an excess of guilt feelings. |