A Comparative Study in the levels of Human Values: People’s Republic of China, Singapore, Taiwan, and the United States

This study investigates the relative importance of human values at four levels: (a) global, (b) national, (c) family, and (d) individual, among university students from four countries – the United States (137 females, 78 males, one unspecified), the People’s Republic of China (66 females, 170 males, one unspecified), Taiwan (156 females, 101 males), and Singapore (148 females, 119 males). Students rated the importance of passing on the 68 items in the Child Socialization Value Survey to their children or to future generations. Principal Components Analysis was performed on the pooled sample of student responses and revealed a five‐factor solution described by: universalism, family, nationalism, prestige, and autonomy. This study demonstrates that the values endorsed by samples of Chinese across different geopolitical backgrounds are not consistent.