PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS

Although valuations can be measured in the presmt approach, this does not mean that people always make valuations rationally. Many factors such as limited cognitive ^ility, aroused emotion, prejudice, personality, biased information and so on may easily prompt people to make valuations with rigid and narrow scope. The rigid and narrow valuations inevitably confine people to limited choices and actions.

It is always possible to evaluate the same situation fi’om anotho" point of view and appeal to

a

different values. For example, politicians o^different party always emphasize different aspects of the same situation to make it worthy or undesirable. Different interpretation of the situation will bring different feeling, decision and action toward the situation. For example, after Edison's seven-hundredth unsuccessful attempt to invent the electric light, he was asked by a New York Times reporter. How does it feel to have failed seven hundred times?' The great inventor responded, I have not failed seven hundred times. I have not failed once. I have succeeded in proving that those seven hundred ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.' Several thousand more experiments later, Edison finally found the one that would woric and invented the electric light (McKenna, 1993).

The individual with the most choices is the one who has most ways of evaluating things and hence the greatest scope of opportunities, which increases flexibility (McKenna, 1993). It may be regarded that too many choices would confuse the decision making, but without a clear valuation underiying each alternative, even if the number o f choices is two, the decision is still difScult to make. It should be whether the valuation underlying each choice is clear, instead of the number of choices, that influences directly the decision making. The present {^proach can help people to make their valuations more systematically and thoroughly. With the four dimensions of valuation in mind, the present approach can suggest that when people evaluate a situation, they should think of all the possible persons who are benefited or/and who are damaged by the situation in what values, then assess the importance o f these values. The comprehensive list of values can act as a check list and make it easier to identify all the relevant values.

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Sometime it takes creativity to propose a new valuation. The free association among the situation, each value of the comprehensive list of values, and possible persons involved may help to stimulate new ideas.

In everyday life, people may not always make valuations in terms of values. The present approach can help people to translate their valuations from everyday language into values and urge them to recognize whose interest are represaited by these values. This kind of translation can make different valuations easy to be compared, and enhance people's self-awareness in their own and others' valuations.

The ability to translate everyday valuations into values can also help to improve interpersonal the

communication. Because values express the desired in social acceptable way, if people can tell^ther party's valuations in terms of values, it could decrease the other party's denial and dismissal, and thereby smooth the communication process; and if people can make the values embedded in their suggestions salient, it could make the suggestions more acceptable to the other party.

To illustrate how the present approach can be taken into operation, a case of decision making is given as follows.

Ms. X had a good job in her own country. Her husband was going to work abroad for a year. He wanted his wife and young son to go with him. She had been distressed by the dilemma for weeks. If she went with him, she would lose her job, and it might not be easy to find another good one. If not, she and her son would separate from him for one year. Ms. X was suggested a procedure to make her own mind. Because go- and not-to-go- decisions are mutually exclusive, assessment about go-decision would be enough.

First, she listed every possible combination of the persons who were related to the decision. The list included seven units as follows: [she], [he], [son], [she and he], [she and son], [he and son], [she, he

th a t

and son]. Second, she wrote down the possible rewards and costs^resuhed from the go-decision under each person unit in her own words. Third, she identified the relevant values to each reward and cost from a list of values. Fourth, she assessed the importance o f these values to her. After compared the total importance of rewards and costs, Ms. X accepted the go-decision with the peace of mind, because she felt that she had considered the decision as thoroughly as possible. Moreover, some of the possible rewards she wrote down were also the goals she wanted to achieve from the go-decision. Finally, h was suggested that she ask her husband to assess the same decision with the same procedure, then they could compare and discuss their assessment together. This would increase their understanding about each other.

The practical implications o f the present approach will be useful in many domains such as education, counselling, decision making, advertisement, policy analysis, personal self-growth and so on.

7.5 CONCLUSION

Lewin (1945) remarked that nothing is so practical as a good theory. This thesis has proposed a theory which hopefully integrated values, valuations, situations, attitudes and behaviour. The valuation processes emphasized in the theory bridge the gap between values and situations, and therd)y, clear the relation between values, attitudes and behaviour. The measurement o f valuations derived from this theory enables researchers to measure directly the cognitive process of interaction between person and situation in terms of valuations at the individual level. The empirical data reported in this thesis suggest that the measurement of valuations can be applied to study various topics within and between cultures. Although the relations between behaviour and valuations are not empirically studied in this work due to limited resources, the relations are well discussed. The implication that the measurement of valuations can be applied in wide range is consistent with Rokeach's (1973) belief that "the consequences of human values will be manifested in virtually all phenomena that social scientists might consider worth investigating and understanding' (p. 3), except that "the consequences of human values' should be the consequences of human valuations.

Viewed from the present approach, the previous approaches, Rokeach's approach in particular, to values research have been found that their theories are incomplete, and therefore, the empirical data resulted from their measurement of values are limited or even misleading. Now, it is the time to shift from these old approaches to this more accurate approach and new directions for values and valuations research.

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APPENDIX 1