News

New preprint addressing value systems compared across age, gender and education attainment groups is publicly available at OSF, including all the study materials required in reproducing the reported results: https://osf.io/vewf9.

(a) ALLBUS Network

(b) ESS Network

(c) ALLBUS Node centrality

(d) ESS Node centrality

Figure 1: Results example showcasing significant central value motivational goals in the respective value systems as well as network visualizations

Here you can read the abstract:

According to theory, there is a finite set of existential questions from which a finite set of values as ideals of living derive and are available to people across cultures and history. Drawing on a psychological network approach, this paper revisits this universality principle in human values proposing that wellbeing is a proxy for (un)resolved existential questions. I argue that value motivational goals form together with wellbeing a psychological system structured as a network of dynamically interconnected cognitive and emotional reactions (value systems in short). The present research examined value systems informed in three value theories measured in four representative surveys in Germany between 2012-2014. I argued that demographic groups based on age, gender and education attainment face group specific challenges to wellbeing thus they experience existential questions differently. I compared value systems across these demographics in view of local and global network characteristics. Results highlight that specific value motivational goals are central in the value systems of each group in addition to uncovering novel insights into dynamics amongst value motivational goals and unique associations with wellbeing. The present findings emphasize the contextual embedding of human values, both at a meta-theoretical level and in view of desirable enabling contexts.