The World’s Most Influential Values, In One Graphic
Our basic values can inform ideals, interests, political preferences, environmental views, and even career choices.
With sweeping data covering half a million surveys in 152 languages, Valuegraphics identifies 56 values that influence human behavior. It uncovers what people care most about around the world, through a contextualized dataset.
The 10 Most Important Values
Individual motivations and values are universally organized. That said, research shows that the hierarchy of these values varies significantly.
According to Valuegraphics, here are the top 10 values we share across cultures.
| Rank | Value |
|---|---|
| 1 | Family |
| 2 | Relationships |
| 3 | Financial Security |
| 4 | Belonging |
| 5 | Community |
| 6 | Personal Growth |
| 7 | Loyalty |
| 8 | Religion/Spirituality |
| 9 | Employment Security |
| 10 | Personal Responsibility |
While it may not be surprising that family emerges as the most important value globally, it’s interesting to note that a number of other ‘connectedness’ values—such as relationships and belonging—emerged in the top 10. Values of loyalty, and religion/spirituality ranked #6, and #7, respectively.
At the same time, security-related values, including financial and employment security, score highly around the world.
From a business and leadership context, values are interesting in that they can guide how people and consumers make their decisions. As people interact with the world, different experiences can ‘engage’ their most closely-held values.
“If you can understand what your target audience cares about, what they spend their lives chasing, now you have an actual chance to use data to understand how to engage and influence and motivate them.”
-David Allison, Founder of Valuegraphics
