Values and their ways of guiding the psyche
pp. 225-244
in: Jaan Valsiner, Giuseppina Marsico, Nandita Chaudhary, Virginia Dazzani (eds), Psychology as the science of human being, Berlin, Springer, 2016Abstract
Along this chapter, I claim for the necessity of analyzing complex psychological phenomena and discuss cultural psychology's contributions to the issue, stressing the fundamental power of values as specific affective-semiotic hypergeneralized fields coconstructed along the past–present–future time dimension. From an affective-semiotic approach to cultural psychology, I address the complexities of developmental processes related to the interplay between the developing dialogical self-system (DSS) and the specific mediators–values—which play a central role in regulating particular life trajectories and in the emergence of specific personal characteristics. Moreover, I elaborate on the ontogenesis of values and on their function of orienting the individual's actions, as I present and discuss data from empirical research developed in our Laboratory at the University of Brasilia designed to investigate the topic. Next, this chapter highlights some possible venues to investigate the ontogenesis of values. Finally yet importantly, I argue that to approach this subject in fruitful ways requires to acknowledge the centrality of meaning constructive processes from a systemic perspective, in order to meet the challenge of analyzing the complex and dynamic nature of the phenomena taking into account the historical, sociocultural, and subjective factors.