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It is an incredibly complex conflict that is hard to summarise for people with little background knowledge. Do not assume all Hispanic and Latin American peoples are the same. There are many different countries and cultures across Central and South America that vary greatly in many aspects of life. Avoid homogenising Colombians with people from other areas of the continent. All of South America is also technically American and Colombians can find it frustrating when the term is reduced to refer to just those from the USA.
Other Considerations. Business Culture. Colombians in Australia. Sign up for free. Inclusion Program Join over organisations already creating a better workplace. Spanish explorers arrived in Colombia in but didn't establish a settlement until These settlers were obsessed with finding gold and other valuables, and by they had conquered the Muisca and stolen all their gold and jewels.
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Please be respectful of copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited. Valores Humanos de los Colombianos. This paper was supported in part by grant of the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development to the second author.
Authors are grateful to this agency. E-mail: ruben. The objective of this research work has been to get to know the axiological orientation of Colombians, and gather empirical evidence regarding the suitability of the functionalist theory of values in Colombia, testing its content and structure hypothesis and the psychometric properties of its measurement Basic Values Questionnaire BVQ. The BVQ evaluates sexuality, success, social support, knowledge, emotion, power, affection, religiosity, health, pleasure, prestige, obedience, personal stability, belonging, beauty, tradition, survival, and maturity.
Two hundred and thirty people participated men and women whose average age was They answered the BVQ and demographic questions. The results gave support to the content hypothesis six valorative sub-functions: excitement , promotion , existence , suprapersonal , interactive and normative and to structure the values represented in two dimensions: orientation type and motivation type.
Verifying previous research, it was found that Colombians presented a value orientation which was more social than personal , and more idealistic humanist than materialistic.
The main values were success, maturity and affection. The least important were power, tradition, beauty and emotion. In conclusion, there is an initial evidence of the suitability about the functionalist theory of values in this culture, although it is advisable to conduct new studies, even thinking in an emic measurement of the values in this country.
Participaron personas varones y mujeres con edad promedio de Values are a key element in the cognitive system of people, allowing them to explain their attitudes, opinions and behavior Rokeach, Therefore, to know which values are priorities in certain people, groups or cultures, it is important to understand them including their preferences and decisions.
Thisstudy has as its main objective to contribute with the topic of human values in Colombia, evaluating the adaptation of a theoretical model that could be useful when analyzing what the values of its people are and their influence on the Colombian culture and the socioeconomic development of the country. It represents as well, an attempt to know which the valued priorities of the Colombian people are.
In this case, for example, their scores indicated a high avoidance of uncertainty, eluding risks and prioritizing strict rules, and also low individualism, being a society which attributes importance to one's own group, emphasizing broad relations and the compliance with other people. These results suggest a more personal than social value orientation, contrary to the previous discoveries presented by Hofstede This set of non-consensual findings requires additional studies on the values of Colombians to be done.
This has been precisely the objective of this research work, which also tries to prove the suitability of the Functionalist theory of values , which is described below. Although more widely known theories of values exist e.
This is not a theory contrary to the others which consider the motivational nature of human values Inglehart, ; Schwartz, It is essentially an integrating model, although a parsimonious one, which assumes four main assumptions Gouveia, ; Gouveia et al. Human nature. It admits the benevolent or positive nature of human beings, assuming only positive values. Although some values possess a negative character for certain individuals e.
Motivational basis. Some authors define values as transformations of human needs Rokeach, ; Schwartz, , but this process is not obvious and its consideration is avoided in the following definition. On the contrary, the most frequently accepted idea of values as cognitive representations of human needs is assumed Kluckhohn, ; Maslow, Terminal character.
Classification of values into instrumental and terminal seems to be a language problem: terminal values are nouns, while the instrumental ones are adjectives Rohan, In this way, in the present model only terminal values have been taken into account, since they are fewer in number and more coherent with the conception of values as something desirable and transcendent.
Terminal values are superior cognitive objectives, not limiting them to immediate and biologically urgent objectives Rokeach, Individual guide-principles. Even when theoretical approaches exist in respect to cultural values Hosftede, ; Inglehart, , it is in reality values of a group of individuals.
Culture incorporates the values which have been useful for the survival of the group, making them desirable. Such values facilitate the continuity of the society, given that they promote harmonious existence among its members. Therefore, the values are conceived as general categories of orientation for the individuals. According to Gouveia et al. Gouveia ; Gouveia et al.
In this way, functions of values are defined by this author as psychological aspects that values fulfill when guiding behavior and cognitively represent needs. Such functions are described in the following manner:. First function of the values: to guide human behavior.
Three types of value orientation are assumed: personal , central and social. The personal types e. There still exists a third group of values, which are not completely and exclusively personal or social Gouveia, Schwartz labels such values as mixed motivational types , although he does not offer any theoretical explanation as to why these values are located among the personal and social ones.
The functionalist theory proposes that the values which are among the personal and the social ones are there because they are relevant to explain or support these values Gouveia et al. This is the reason why this third group of values is called central values. In this way, the function of values as a guide to human behavior is defined as orientation type , existing three possibilities: personal , central and social.
Second function of the values: to express human necessities A perfect correspondence is not observed between human needs and values, although it is possible to identify values in respect to the needs that they cognitively represent. Maslow, In fact, values could be classified as materialistic pragmatic or idealistic humanitarian Marks, ; Inglehart, ; Ronen, The materialistic values are related to practical ideas, and an emphasis in these values indicates an orientation towards specific goals and normative rules.
Individuals guided by such values usually think in terms of biological survival, prioritizing their own existence and the conditions that could assure it. In contrast, idealistic humanitarian values express a universal orientation, based on more abstract ideas and principles. Compared to the materialistic values, the idealistic ones are unspecific, not being directed necessarily toward concrete goals.
Therefore, this second function of values is directed to cognitively represent the human needs, which correspond to the motivation type dimension, with two possibilities: materialistic pragmatic and idealistic humanitarian. Joining the two functions of human values: six valorative sub-functions. The functionalist theory considers two main functions of values, which correspond to two axes in the representation of its structure Figure 1.
The horizontal axis belongs to the function of the values to guide human actions, representing the orientation type dimension personal, central and social values , while the vertical axis indicates the function of the values to represent human needs, corresponding to the motivation type dimension materialistic and idealistic values.
Joining these two dimensions, that is to say, intersecting the horizontal and vertical axes, there are six sub-functions of values: excitement, promotion, existence, suprapersonal, interactive and normative. As it is observed in figure 1 , the three types of orientation are represented by two sub-functions each: personal excitement and promotion , central existence and suprapersonal and social interactive and normative.
Three sub-functions represent each one of the motivation types: materialistic existence, normative and actualization and idealistic excitement, interactive and suprapersonal. In this way, the sub-functions could be mapped in a design 3 X 2. The arrows that come from the central orientation that is, from the sub-functions existence and suprapersonal indicate that the corresponding values represent the main source or reference of the other values, being compatible to them.
Based on this theoretical framework, two major hypotheses resulted, corresponding to content and structure of the valorative functions. Content and structure of the valorative functions. The two valorative functions are reference frameworks that permit the derivation of the six sub-functions, conceived as latent structures, which require to be represented through specific values. The values content hypothesis takes as reference these values as representation of the sub-functions.
Below, the six sub-functions and the selected values that represent them are described. Once the central values constitute the principal source on which the other values are supported, that is to say, they represent the "backbone" of values organization, the description of the sub-functions begins with existence and the related sub-functions, and then passes to suprapersonal and the corresponding sub-functions.
Existence sub-function. It represents the basic physiological needs e. It is compatible with personal and social orientations in the materialistic motivational domain, once the purpose is to guarantee the basic conditions for the biological and psychological survival of the individual. This is the most important sub-function the materialistic motivation represents, being the source of other two sub-functions that represent such motivation: normative and actualization.
Health, survival and stability are values which could represent this sub-function. Promotion sub-function. The needs of self-esteem are represented by values of this sub-function Maslow, ; Ronen, , which corresponds to a materialistic motivation but with a personal orientation.
Its values have origin in a personal principle to guide the life of the individuals, while they place emphasis in material fulfillments; they could be a demand for prosperous social interactions and adequate institutional functioning Schwartz, Individuals oriented by these values attribute importance to hierarchy when this is based on the demonstration of personal competence, lending importance to an organized and structured society, being practical in their decisions and behavior. The next three values permit representation of this sub-function: success, prestige and power.
Normative sub-function. This is the third sub-function with a materialistic motivation, but it has a social orientation. The necessity of control and the indispensable preconditions to satisfy needs Maslow, ; institutional and social demands, according to Schwartz, are represented by this sub-function; it reflects the importance of preserving the culture and the conventional norms. Prioritizing normative values evidences a vertical orientation, in which compliance to authority is important.
The values tradition, obedience and religiosity represent this sub-function. Suprapersonal sub-function. This sub-function presents a central orientation, but indicates an idealistic motivation; it represents the aesthetic and cognition needs, as well as the higher need of self-actualization Maslow, ; Ronen, Its values help categorize the world in a consistent way, strengthening the clarity and stability of a person's cognitive organization, and indicating the importance of abstract ideas, with less emphasis on concrete and material matters Inglehart, This sub-function is compatible with the social and personal values in the idealistic motivational type, being the source of other two sub-functions that represent this motivational type: experimentation and interactive.
The following values can represent it: beauty, knowledge and maturity. Excitement sub-function. It represents an idealistic motivation, but with a personal orientation. The physiological need of satisfaction, in a broad sense, or the inclination towards the pleasure principle hedonism; Maslow, ; Ronen, is represented by values of this sub-function.
It is less pragmatic in the search for social status or to guarantee social harmony and security; its values contribute to the promotion of changes and innovations in the structure of social organizations.
The values emotion , pleasure and sexuality could represent this sub-function. Interactive sub-function. This is the third sub-function that represents an idealistic motivation, but has a social orientation. The common destiny and the affective experience between individuals are emphasized by values of this sub-function, which represent the needs of belonging, love and affiliation Maslow, Their values are essential to establish, regulate and maintain interpersonal relationships.
Social contacts are goals in themselves, placing emphasis on more affective and abstract attributes. Affection, social support and coexistence are values that can represent it.
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