According to OpenStax Introduction to Sociology 3e, what does the term “values” refer to in sociology?
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Sociology · Foundations
Values
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values Shared beliefs within a culture about what is good, right, desirable, and worth striving for; the ideals, principles, and standards members hold in high regard. Full entry → are the shared beliefs The tenets or convictions that people hold to be true, which values help transmit and teach within a culture. Full entry → a group holds about what is good, right, and worth striving for — the principles and standards members of a culture hold in high regard, as OpenStax’s Introduction to Sociology puts it. Values are not rules; they are the commitments behind rules. norms The visible and invisible rules of conduct through which societies are structured; expectations for behavior that reflect what a society defines as good, right, and important. Full entry →, the rules of conduct, express them. Value orientations vary: some societies prize independence, others the group; some tradition, others new ideas. Values can clash with one another, and they shift across generations.
Why this matters
Values sit underneath nearly everything sociology studies. Academically, they connect individuals to institutions: a school, a court, a workplace, and a family all run on shared beliefs about what matters, and those beliefs explain why institutions look the way they do. Practically, reading values changes how you hear disagreements — a zoning fight or a family argument is often two commitments colliding, not a factual error. And values matter forward: because they shift across generations, understanding them lets you see social change coming before it arrives in laws and headlines. This lesson is a lens for the rest of the course: every institution, movement, and norm you meet later is a value made visible.
The college version
What values are
Sociologists use the word values in a specific way: it does not mean monetary worth. In OpenStax Introduction to Sociology 3e, values are the ideals, principles, and standards members of a culture hold in high regard — a culture’s sense of what is good and bad, beautiful and ugly, sought and avoided. A compact way to say the same thing: values are shared beliefs about what is good, right, and worth striving for. They are deeply embedded: people absorb them growing up, and they are critical for learning a culture’s beliefs, which are the tenets or convictions people hold to be true. Original example: in the coastal town of Port Merrick, most residents believe a neighbor who falls on hard times should be helped before any paperwork is done. That conviction rests on the value that mutual care is good — that looking out for one another is what makes the town worth living in. Notice the shape of the example: the belief is about how the world works (“help arrives quickly here”), and the value is about what is good (“caring for neighbors is right”). The two work together. Values also belong to culture’s nonmaterial side: they are ideas and standards, not objects, which is why you cannot photograph a value the way you can photograph a town hall — though the town hall may have been built because of one.
Values versus norms
Values and norms are sibling concepts, and the line between them matters. Values are beliefs about what is good and worth pursuing. Norms are shared expectations for how people behave — the visible and invisible rules of conduct that structure societies. The same content can appear in both forms: a society that values honesty will develop norms like returning extra change and not copying on exams. Values answer “what matters?”; norms answer “what should we do?” Original example: the Darby family values putting the family first. The norm that expresses it is concrete: whoever cooks Sunday dinner is never left to clean up alone — everyone carries a plate to the sink. The value is the belief; the norm is the standing expectation of behavior. Societies encourage compliance with norms through sanctions — rewards for upholding them, like praise or bonuses, and punishments for violating them, like frowns or fines — and sanctions are one way values are maintained in daily life.
How values vary
Researchers who compare societies across the world have named two widely used contrasts among value orientations. The first, individualistic versus collectivist, appears in OpenStax: individualistic cultures place a high value on individuality and independence, while collectivist cultures give the welfare of the group priority over the individual. One line each: “my own path” versus “the group comes first.” The second contrast comes from the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map, built from decades of World Values Survey data: traditional values On the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map, values that emphasize religion, parent–child ties, and deference to authority. Full entry → emphasize religion, parent–child ties, and deference to authority, while secular-rational values On the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map, values that place less emphasis on religion, traditional family, and authority. Full entry → place less emphasis on religion, traditional family, and authority. The same analysis adds a second axis, survival versus self-expression values — economic and physical security on one end, tolerance, well-being, and participation on the other. These are descriptive dimensions researchers use to compare societies, not a report card: no society sits purely at one pole, and the WVS itself notes that the indicators capture only a handful of the many beliefs involved.
Value conflict, where values show up, and value change
Values can clash. OpenStax is blunt that fulfilling a society’s values can be difficult: values often suggest how people should behave, but they do not accurately reflect how people do behave. That gap is the difference between ideal culture The standards a society would like to embrace and live up to, as distinct from the way people actually behave. Full entry → — the standards a society would like to live up to — and real culture How people in a society actually behave in practice, which can fall short of the society’s stated ideals. Full entry → — what actually happens. Conflicts also run between values held at the same time. Original example: in the city of Ashwood, residents value both protecting the old-growth forest on the north edge of town and keeping property taxes among the lowest in the region. When the council proposes buying the forest as public parkland, the debate splits along those two commitments: one side argues from preservation, the other from affordability. Neither side lacks values; the values themselves pull in different directions. This example describes the shape of the conflict; it takes no position on how Ashwood should decide. Values show up in three places worth naming. In institutions: schools, courts, workplaces, and families build rules and routines around shared values — a school that values achievement has grades and honor rolls. In choices: people spend time, money, and energy on what they value, which is why advertising appeals to values rather than to product features. In arguments: when people argue, they usually justify positions by appealing to a value — “this is about fairness,” “this is about safety” — which is why debates so often look like values colliding. And values change. OpenStax states it plainly: values are not static; they change across time and between groups as people evaluate, debate, and change collective social beliefs. The World Values Survey documents one clear pattern: an intergenerational shift — birth cohorts that grew up taking survival and economic security for granted put measurably more emphasis on self-expression, subjective well-being, and quality of life than their parents’ cohorts did. Values do not flip like a switch; they migrate, one generation at a time.
Eli explains
The same idea, in plain words
Explain it like I’m 10
Values are a group’s shared answer to the question “what matters?” — the beliefs about what is good, right, and worth striving for. They are not the rules themselves but the reasons behind the rules: a society that values honesty develops rules about returning extra change. Different societies answer differently — some prize independence, some the group; some tradition, some new ideas. Values can pull against one another, and they change slowly, mostly as new generations grow up in different circumstances. You rarely see a value directly; you see it in what institutions reward, what people choose, and what arguments sound convincing.
Picture it like this
Think of values as the operating system of a social machine. The OS runs underneath everything — you never see it, but every app only works because it is running. Norms are the interface rules the OS enforces; institutions are the apps built on top of them.
Where the picture stops working
An operating system is designed by engineers on purpose, but values grow organically, are passed down unevenly, and often contradict one another — no software ships with two conflicting cores the way a society can value both low taxes and generous parks. And nobody can reboot or update a society’s values on a schedule; change happens through generations of argument and experience, not a system update.
Worked example
The Alden Street Food Cooperative has run for a decade on one stated value: fair access — every neighbor should be able to shop there regardless of income. That value grew norms: prices set at cost plus a small margin, and a weekly pay-what-you-can produce table. When a new member proposes premium-priced organic lines to fund a kitchen renovation, the meeting splits. One side argues the premiums violate fair access, the coop’s founding value. The other argues the renovation itself serves the value, because a bigger kitchen means more affordable food for more people. Both sides appeal to the same value; they disagree about what it requires. The board settles on a compromise — a voluntary round-up for the renovation — that leaves the value intact. Read the meeting transcript and you see the whole lesson: values animated the institution’s rules, guided each member’s choice of argument, collided, and then adjusted, without anyone abandoning the founding value itself.
Key takeaway
Values are a society’s shared beliefs about what is good, right, and worth striving for — invisible commitments that shape institutions, choices, and arguments, can conflict with one another, and shift across generations.
Quick check
3 questions here, of 5 in this lesson’s practice set. Answers stay hidden until you check.
The Port Merrick neighborhood garden posts this rule: “Take one basket of produce per visit, so there is enough for everyone.” The gardener who founded it says the rule exists because everyone deserves fresh food. Which part of the scenario is a value, as sociologists use the term?
Choose an answer, then check it.
On the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map built from World Values Survey data, what do the traditional and secular-rational poles contrast?
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Study tools & related lessonsYou’ll learn to · Common mistakes · Easily confused · Key vocabulary · Related
You’ll learn to
- Define values as shared beliefs about what is good, right, and worth striving for, and attribute the working definition to OpenStax Introduction to Sociology 3e.
- Distinguish values from norms, using an original example of each.
- Name two ways value orientations vary across societies — individualistic versus collectivist, and traditional versus secular-rational — and attribute the second to the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map.
- Explain how values can conflict within a society, using an original descriptive example.
- Describe three places values show up: institutions, individual choices, and public arguments.
- Explain how values change across generations, citing the World Values Survey’s finding of a shift toward postmaterialist values.
Common mistakes
Values are rules you have to follow.
Values are beliefs about what is good and worth striving for; the rules — norms — are the behavioral expectations that grow out of them. Breaking a norm draws a sanction; holding a value is a commitment, not a behavior.
If people say they value something, they must behave that way.
Values describe what a society would like to live up to (ideal culture), not how people actually behave (real culture). OpenStax notes that values often suggest how people should behave without accurately reflecting how they do.
Labeling value orientations ranks societies.
The individualistic/collectivist and traditional/secular contrasts are descriptive research dimensions, not verdicts. The World Values Survey presents them as analytical tools; neither pole is treated as superior.
Values are permanent and inherited unchanged.
Values are not static — they change across time and between groups (OpenStax), and the World Values Survey documents an intergenerational shift toward postmaterialist values in cohorts that grew up in security.
Easily confused
Values vs. Norms
Values are shared beliefs about what is good and worth striving for; norms are the visible and invisible rules of conduct that express those beliefs in behavior. One value, like honesty, can anchor many norms, like returning extra change or citing sources.
Ideal culture vs. Real culture
Ideal culture is the set of standards a society would like to live up to; real culture is how people actually behave. The gap between them is normal and is where value conflict becomes visible.
Individualistic value orientation vs. Collectivist value orientation
Individualistic cultures prize independence and individuality; collectivist cultures give the welfare of the group priority. Both are descriptive orientations researchers use to compare societies, not character judgments.
Traditional values vs. Secular-rational values
On the Inglehart–Welzel map, traditional values emphasize religion, family ties, and deference to authority, while secular-rational values place less emphasis on each — a research dimension, not a ranking.
Key vocabulary
- values
- Shared beliefs within a culture about what is good, right, desirable, and worth striving for; the ideals, principles, and standards members hold in high regard.
- beliefs
- The tenets or convictions that people hold to be true, which values help transmit and teach within a culture.
- norms
- The visible and invisible rules of conduct through which societies are structured; expectations for behavior that reflect what a society defines as good, right, and important.
- ideal culture
- The standards a society would like to embrace and live up to, as distinct from the way people actually behave.
- real culture
- How people in a society actually behave in practice, which can fall short of the society’s stated ideals.
- individualistic value orientation
- A cultural pattern in which people place a high value on individuality and independence rather than on group obligations.
- collectivist value orientation
- A cultural pattern in which the welfare of the group takes priority over that of the individual.
- traditional values
- On the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map, values that emphasize religion, parent–child ties, and deference to authority.
- secular-rational values
- On the Inglehart–Welzel cultural map, values that place less emphasis on religion, traditional family, and authority.
- postmaterialist values
- Values emphasizing self-expression, subjective well-being, and quality of life, found especially among cohorts that grew up taking survival for granted.
Sources & references
- 3.2 Elements of Culture — Introduction to Sociology 3e — OpenStax, Rice University
- 3.1 What Is Culture? — Introduction to Sociology 3e — OpenStax, Rice University
- Findings and Insights — Inglehart–Welzel Cultural Map — World Values Survey
EliExplains lessons are original prose written from the open, credible references above. See Copyright & Licensing.
Researched 2026-08-22
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