Values & Attitudes

Some researchers see values as consisting of large sets of related attitudes. For e.g. Fishbem and Ajzen included three components in attitudes informational (Ideas, beliefs and values and information), emotional (feelings of likes and dislikes or positive and negative) and behavioural (tendency to behave). Thus values are a part of attitudes.

Attitudes are specific and related to distinct objects, people or ideas: values are more general and are not related to any object or situation. They consist of statements of goodness or badness associated to the attitudes people hold. So the values are beliefs about which attitudes we should have or how we should behave.

Similarities

• Both influence behaviour of people in powerful way.
• Both are learned and acquired from the same source – experience with people and objects.
• They are relatively permanent and resistant to change.
• They have reciprocal influence and are used interchangeably.

Differences

• Attitudes reflect how one feels about something. They are learned predispositions towards aspects of our environment. Values focus on the judgment of what ought to be.
• Attitudes re[resent several beliefs and feelings focused on a specific object, idea, people or situations. Values, on the other hand, represent a single belief that guides actions and judgment across objest and situations.
• Attitudes and beliefs are mostly personal experiences. Values though learned from people and institutions, contain a moral flavour. Social and cultura, morals have influence on the formation of values. Values, therefore, are yardsticks to guide actions, attitudes, evaluations and justifications of the self and others’.