Knowing Yourself-Values
A personality consists of two main components: disposition and values. Disposition is the default, or unconscious, way that a person behaves and responds to situations. While disposition is our default way of acting, values are our deliberate thoughts and beliefs about how we should act and behave. A value is a sustained belief that a certain approach or result is more socially or individually preferable than another.
When we talk about values, we differentiate between means values and ends values. Have you ever heard the expression, “the means don’t justify the ends?” The “means” is our approach to achieve a result, and the result is the “ends.” So from this perspective, a means value is a sustained belief about how we should act or behave over time to achieve a goal or objective. An ends value is a sustained belief about an end state that could be achieved. For example, we may have an ends value of trust in that we believe that trust is a valued and important factor in a relationship. A related means value might be honesty, in that we believe that a person must be honest in their interactions and behaviors to achieve a trusting relationship.
Values can also be either programmed or developed. A programmed value is a belief that we act on over time without conscious thought of choice. On the other hand, a developed value is one that meets five specific criteria: a developed value must be chosen, it must be chosen from alternatives, it must be chosen with an understanding of the consequences, it must be acted on over time, and it must be “publicly owned.” Think about when you were growing up and you associated certain beliefs based on your parents. Maybe it was a religious belief, a political belief, or something else. Did you value that belief because you choose the belief yourself and fully understood the alternatives and consequences or was it more of an unconscious behavior based on influence from others? This may have been a programmed value.
Let’s consider an example of little Tommy who is a young boy in grade school. Tommy has a programmed value of honesty. His parents taught him to be honest and always tell the truth, and he believes that this is an important thing. But one day at school without his friend seeing, he accidentally breaks his best friend Jimmy’s toy. When Jimmy comes over and sees the broken toy, Tommy is confronted with a new situation that he’s never experienced, and he has a decision to make. Out of embarrassment, Tommy lies about the broken toy. Unfortunately, another person in the class saw what happened and tells Jimmy that Tommy broke the toy. Jimmy is very upset about the toy, but even worse, he is upset that Tommy lied to him, and decides not to invite Tommy to play with him after school anymore. Tommy decides that moving forward he will always tell the truth to his friends. Tommy has now experienced and understands the consequences of his value of honesty, he willingly chooses this value from the alternatives, and he intends to acts on the value over time. Tommy has now begun to develop the value of honesty.
This concept of values is a very important part of our personality. The more developed our value system, the better we can adjust our actions and behaviors to align with the type of person we believe we should be. Our values help shape and alter our actions to choose our behaviors, despite how our disposition may be influencing us. Let’s look at an example with the disposition mode of response for fight or flight. A person whose disposition is high on fight will embrace challenges and tend toward conflict. They may instinctively argue or even physically attack another person when threatened. But if that individual maintains a value of nonviolence, they will likely adjust their behavior and not act solely based on their disposition.
The more developed and stronger their values, the more likely an individual is to act in alignment with their values. Think about some of your values and beliefs. Do you have a core set of values? Are they means or ends values? And are they programmed or developed values?
References
Zigarmi, D., Edeburn, C., Blanchard, K., & O'Connor, M. (2004). The leader within: Learning enough about yourself to lead others. Pearson Professional Education.