Introduction to the Special Section Value Development from Middle Childhood to Early Adulthood: New Insights from Longitudinal and Genetically Informed Research

Research into values at an early age has only started recently, although it has expanded quickly and dynamically in the past years. The purpose of this article is twofold: First, it provides an introduction to a special section that aims to help fill the gap in value development research. The special section brings together four new longitudinal and genetically informed studies of value development from the beginning of middle childhood through early adulthood. Second, this article reviews recent research from this special section and beyond, aiming to provide new directions to the field. With new methods for assessing children's values and an increased awareness of the role of values in children's and adolescents' development, the field now seems ripe for an in-depth investigation. Our review of empirical evidence shows that, as is the case with adults, children's values are organized based on compatibilities and conflicts in their underlying motivations. Values show some consistency across situations, as well as stability across time. This longitudinal stability tends to increase with age, although mean changes are also observed. These patterns of change seem to be compatible with Schwartz's (1992) theory of values (e.g., if the importance of openness to change values increases, the importance of conservation values decreases). The contributions of culture, family, peers, significant life events, and individual characteristics to values are discussed, as well as the development of values as guides for behavior.

Personality and performance on digit span tests in online and offline settings.

This paper describes two studies examining links between personality and performance on a cognitive test in online and laboratory settings. Study 1 was completed online. 345 participants passively recruited through a personality assessment website completed a Five Factor Model personality inventory derived from the International Personality Item Pool. They then completed an online text-based digit span test. This required participants to repeat increasingly longer strings of digits, either in the same order (forward) or in the opposite of the presentation order (reverse). Conventional digit span tasks ask participants to respond verbally; in this instance they responded by typing the digits. Agreeableness and Openness to Experience each had small but significant associations with forward and reverse digit span. In a second, laboratory based, study, 103 participants completed paper versions of the IPIP Five Factor inventory, the NEO-FFI, and a battery of cognitive tests including the WAIS 4 digit span test. In this instance, Agreeableness and Openness to Experience were not significantly correlated with digit span measures. Taken together, these studies suggest that personality characteristics may influence performance on an online cognitive test. This effect was not seen in an offline version of the study. The paper will consider potential implications for online testing, for equivalence of online and offline methods, and for links between personality and performance on this cognitive test.

Values in middle childhood: Social and genetic contributions

Theories of value development often identify adolescence as the period for value formation, and cultural and familial factors as the sources for value priorities. However, recent research suggests that value priorities can be observed as early as in middle childhood, and several studies, including one on preadolescents (Knafo & Spinath, 2011), have suggested a genetic contribution to individual differences in values. In the current study, 174 pairs of monozygotic and dizygotic 7-year old Israeli twins completed the Picture-Based Value Survey for Children (PBVS–C; Döring et al., 2010). We replicated basic patterns of relations between value priorities and variables of socialisation – gender, religiosity, and socioeconomic status– that have been found in studies with adults. Most important, values of Self-transcendence, Self-enhancement, and Conservation, were found to be significantly affected by genetic factors (29%, 47% and 31% respectively), as well as non-shared environment (71%, 53% and 69% respectively). Openness to change values, in contrast, were found to be unaffected by genetic factors at this age and were influenced by shared (19%) and non-shared (81%) environment. These findings support the recent view that values are formed at earlier ages than had been assumed previously, and they further our understanding of the genetic and environmental factors involved in value formation at young ages.

Reciprocal relations across time between basic values and value-expressive behaviors: A longitudinal study among children

Tracing children’s values and value-expressive behavior over a sixth-month period, we examined stability and change of values and behavior and the reciprocal relations between them. Three hundred and ten sixth-grade students in Italy completed value and value-expressive behavior questionnaires three times in three-month intervals during the scholastic year. We assessed Schwartz's (1992) higher-order values of conservation, openness to change, self-enhancement, and self-transcendence, as well as their respective expressive behaviors. Reciprocal relations over time between values and behaviors were examined using a cross-lagged longitudinal design. Results showed that values and behaviors had reciprocal longitudinal effects on one another, after the stability of the variables was taken into account (i.e., values predicted change in behaviors, but also behaviors predicted change in values). Our findings also revealed that: (1) values were more stable over time than behaviors, and (2) the longitudinal effect of values on behaviors tended to be stronger than the longitudinal effect of behaviors on values. Findings are discussed in light of the recent developmental literature on value change.

Diversity and Inclusion As the Key to Innovating Talent Management in Law Firms?

In this chapter we argue that there is a need to reconceptualise what we mean by talent in the legal profession beyond a view that the most valuable people are those who have the highest fee-earning potential or the best CV packed with excellent grades and exceptional experiences and extra curricula achievements. And further we need a more sophisticated understanding of how organisational decision-making may be structured to provide developmental opportunities to allow talent to be nurtured and to flourish on individual and team levels. In turn, we suggest that planning, management and accountability cycles within legal entities need to be strengthened so as to ensure creativity and success in a context in which it is possible to deliver on the promise of fair access and promotion. Consequently, this chapter explores the diversity problem within the legal profession(s), further it interrogates what is “talent”, and how and why we should seek to manage and develop it. It then evaluates how talent diversity has been managed in the legal professional context, examined through what we have categorised as three waves of diversity strategies. We interrogate why diversity initiatives have not been more successful given the efforts placed on them by professional bodies and firms themselves. We posit that by using diversity as a case study in talent management legal entities may develop a more effective approach to talent management generally within law firms that will be of benefit to all lawyers and support professionals rather than just those who are from traditionally low participation groups.