Here you can read answers to frequently asked questions about worldviews, asked by students participating in the Worldview Journey. Want to ask us your own questions, or share your comments, with respect to worldviews? You can contact us here.
Why are there only four worldviews?
One could say that there are as many worldviews as there are people. However, generally worldviews refer to the overarching, collectively shared, ‘big stories’ through which humans make sense of their experience and world. These stories guide how whole communities or societies understand reality in a general sense.
Especially the traditional, modern, and postmodern worldviews have been widely recognised by philosophers and sociologists alike. They have also been observed more globally in large-scale cross-cultural research (more on that below). These worldviews thus express larger patterns that most of us are familiar with, and are often relatively easy to recognize.
You can see them as archetypes, or ideal-types, which depict ‘pure’ or idealised patterns. That is, though recognisable in the world around us, they generally do not exist in these ‘pure’ forms, as social reality is inherently messy and complex. They serve mainly as analytical tools, helping us ‘see the forest for the trees’.
While more worldviews could be added, these four worldviews appear dominant in our world today, and useful for analyzing societal developments and political debates (e.g., see this blog or this study). Moreover, the distinction in four worldviews adds a lot of nuance and complexity, compared to the binary approaches often used in social science (as argued here).
How do non-Western worldviews fit into these four worldviews?
Non-Western worldviews are currently not adequately captured in our worldview-model. However, although ‘our’ four worldviews were found in research in a Western context, they appear to be relevant and recognizable beyond the West.
Take for example the insights as emerging from the World Values Survey, a massive dataset exploring human beliefs and values across the world. Data-analysis asserts that there are two major dimensions of cross cultural variation in the world.
One axis ranges from traditional values (resonant with the traditional worldview), to secular-rational values (resonant with the modern worldview). The other axis ranges from survival values (resonant with both traditional and modern worldviews) to self-expression values (resonant with both postmodern and integrative worldviews).
The integrative worldview can be understood as a newer worldview arising in response to the challenges of our late postmodern societies. It’s been described by various philosophers and also increasingly recognized in empirical work, including the study that led to the Worldview Test.
What’s the relationship between religion and these worldviews?
Though people who’s outlook on life is strongly defined by their religion will often identify with the traditional worldview, the relationship is not one-on-one. Clearly, there are traditional people who are not religious, and religious people who are not traditional.
It all depends on one’s interpretation of the religious ideas, values, and concepts in question. For example, people with traditional worldviews will be inclined to a more literalistic and dogmatic interpretation, while people with more integrative worldviews may interpret them in more mystical, universal ways. (The theologian and scholar James Fowler wrote an interesting book about this.)
Moreover, the traditional worldview is as much defined by its (more conventional, traditionally) religious understanding of reality, as it is by its emphasis on family and community, social values, solidarity with the group, socially defined roles and rules, and a higher, transcendental purpose in life.
Do worldviews have a moral vector? Are there ‘bad’ worldviews?
These worldviews are not inherently ‘good’ or ‘bad’. They’re stories, value patterns, and structures that help people make sense of their experience and world.
People’s worldviews are shaped by the context they grew up in, and the challenges they were confronted with. Each worldview brings forth qualities, values, and possibilities, as well as pitfalls and limitations. The morality of one’s behaviors and choices thus depends on how one relates and gives expression to these worldviews, rather than on the content of the worldviews.
At the same time, people’s worldviews can become radicalized, highly ideological, or pathological. This may happen when individuals see their worldview as the only valid perspective, and those who think differently not only as wrong but also as evil. Then worldviews may be used to encourage or justify ‘bad’ behaviors – like the exclusion, oppression, or prosecution of people who think differently.
Each of these four worldviews – though neutral in their basic structure, with potentials as well as pitfalls – may thus be turned into extremist ideologies. For example, the anti-democratic movement of Christian Nationalism may be understood as a radicalized expression of the traditional worldview, while the more extreme aspects of “woke” culture, may be seen as a radicalised manifestation of the postmodern worldview.
Instead of promoting any particular worldview, our educational programs focus on supporting people to develop healthy and inquisitive relationships with their worldviews – fostering the humility, openness, curiosity, tolerance, and reflexivity that are vital for our planetary civilization to flourish.
What is a sustainable worldview?
Just like these worldviews are not inherently good or bad, they’re also not inherently (un)sustainable. Each worldview brings possibilities as well as pitfalls in addressing our planetary issues.
For example, traditional worldviews may coincide with greater willingness to sacrifice and live in more sober ways, while generally having less affinity with green values. Modern worldviews may offer possibilities with their emphasis on science and technology, while also being associated with reductionist and exploitative attitudes towards nature.
At the same time, some worldviews are more inclined to care about sustainability issues than others. As this study showed, people with postmodern and integrative worldviews displayed significantly more concern about climate change as well as more sustainable behaviors, compared with moderns and traditionals. This makes sense, as environmental values fit with the larger story of postmodern and integrative worldviews, including their views on nature.
While some worldviews are more inclined towards sustainable lifestyles, for addressing our global issues engagement with diversity of worldviews is needed. While differences in worldview may lead to misunderstanding, conflict, and inertia, they also bring forth a diversity in solutions and strategies, which may prove crucial for helping us adapt and transform as a society. Worldview-diverse groups also tend to be more innovative and effective in coming to new solutions and perspectives.
How do worldviews translate to concrete behaviors and decisions?
As worldviews assert what is true, valuable, moral, and possible, they instil a sense of who we are, where we come from, and where we are going. Though a worldview is in practice often unconscious and habitual, the general understanding is that it tends to guide and direct human behavior and action to a great degree. As cultural historian Richard Tarnas (2007) put it succinctly: “worldviews create worlds.”
The idea that people’s conceptions of the cosmic universe could influence or shape their concrete actions and social relations, can be traced back to Max Weber, one of the principal founders of modern social science. Weber proposed that a ‘cultural complex of meanings’ may function as an instrument for understanding the behavior of individuals.
Today, this idea has been confirmed in multiple empirical studies, as worldviews have been found to correlate significantly with concrete behaviors, including in the domain of sustainability. At the same time, worldviews can be expressed in many different ways. Also, we know that there are multiple factors influencing concrete behaviors, and our worldviews is just one of them – albeit an important one. In a forthcoming book chapter (in press) on Sustainable Lifestyles, the complex relation between worldviews and sustainable behaviors and lifestyles is unpacked in detail.
How can we use these worldviews to collaborate better with one another?
Bringing awareness to our own worldviews as well as those of others may be powerful way to foster constructive collaboration across diverse groups. As studies have shown, groups that are more diverse – not just demographically but also in terms of worldview – are likely to come to more inclusive and innovative solutions.
Programs like the Worldview Journey support people to explore their own worldview, with the aim of getting some perspective on one’s own perspective. Instead of assuming everyone thinks and values like we do, we enhance our self-awareness, thereby fostering both more self-efficacy as well as more space for others who think differently.
By consciously facilitating an exchange across worldviews, for example through the usage of worldview-diverse groups and/or practices that support more generative forms of dialogue, we train our capacity to look at a certain issue from multiple angles, fostering more complex and inclusive perspectives, and potentially more innovative and effective solutions.
When and how does a shift of worldview happen?
According to Max Weber, one of the founders of modern social science, worldview-change tends to happen when meaning-making satisfaction is low. In reality, worldviews are ever-evolving, always attempting to fulfill their primary function of interpreting human experience, answering the universal human need for meaning, and guiding human action. Sources of change, according to Weber, include rationalization, changing needs of adherents, and disconfirming events (‘anomolies’). Rationalization is the inherent drive of worldviews towards greater systematization, logic, and inner coherence.
As far as we know, a full-blown shift of worldview tends to occur slow, and may take years. At the same time, a perspective shift can happen in a matter of moments. Perhaps, such perspective shifts can be understood as the ‘building blocks’ of larger worldview changes. This process may be akin to Thomas Kunn’s depiction of how paradigm shifts happen in the history of science. According to his observations, initially anomalies – observations that contest the current way of understanding in a certain scientific field (paradigm) – tend to be resisted and oppressed. However, once more anomalies are observed and start to reach a certain threshold, the inevitable happens and the paradigm shifts.
Like these paradigm shifts in science, our personal perspective-shifts may over time result in a shift of worldview. For example, one day you have a powerful experience that evokes a different understanding of what nature is and the role it should play in your life. Although this experience in itself will likely not immediately result in a worldview-shift, when you start having more of these ‘perspective-shifting’ experiences, at some point your worldview may shift. (Check out this study.)
Though there is limited research available that explores how this happens in practice, many people have experienced such shift in their lives. More research is needed to answer this vital question!
Is there a development or evolution of worldviews?
Yes, our worldviews appear to display our species’ possibilities for (social) learning and a gradual expansion of perspectives.
Sociologically, modern worldviews arose after, and in response to the limitations of, traditional worldviews. In their turn, postmodern worldviews arose in response to the problems of the modern worldview, while integrative worldviews seem to respond to the particular challenges of our late postmodern age. This developmental dynamic has been observed by historians and philosophers in the West, as well as in cross cultural data on changing beliefs and values over time.
This understanding also aligns with the insights from developmental psychology. The idea here is that human meaning-making can evolve over the lifespan, increasing in breadth, depth, and complexity. As Kegan and Lahey point out:
“for more than a hundred years, researchers have studied the ways the human being constructs reality and have observed how that constructing can become more expansive, less distorted, less egocentric, and less reactive over time” (2016, p.58).
Such ‘evolutions in meaning-making’ may result in individuals taking greater responsibility for what they think and feel, understanding issues with greater complexity, and considering greater time-horizons, like thinking further into the future. Yet there is considerable variety within any age, and people move through these evolutions at different speeds. Also, “many of us, if not most of us, get stuck in our evolution and do not reach the most complex peaks” (Ibid, p.60).
Though this is a hopeful understanding, there are some things to keep in mind:
- Your result of the Worldview Test only tells you which ‘big story’ you seem to gravitate towards based on the answers you provided. It’s NOT an indication of your state of development or mental evolution in any way.
- Habermas spoke about ‘the dialectics of progress’: Though the evolutionarily later worldviews often display new qualities and possibilities, they also tend to generate new (and often bigger) problems and pathologies.
- This is not a moral order and one worldview is not inherently better than any other one. It all depends on what we do with these worldviews and how we give expression to them.
Instead of seeing this as a moral order or an oppressive ranking system, we believe a developmental or evolutionary view can in fact be highly empowering and life-enhancing, as it invites us to keep learning and growing, to continue to expand our horizons, and to fulfil our greater potentials.
Additionally, this view may evoke a more compassionate understanding of human nature. Problematic behaviors or opinions – like racist views or unsustainable attitudes – may be ascribed to a lack of (conducive conditions for) development, rather than to the moral failings of someone’s character. Instead of writing people off, this view emphasizes that, under the right conditions, each of us has the potential to move beyond narrow and self-centered perspectives, and grow into a wiser and wider self.
Are we moving towards more postmodern and integrative worldviews in the future?
Although we don’t know for sure, given the developmental dynamics of these worldviews, it seems likely that we’re moving towards more postmodern and integrative worldviews, especially also as a result of generational changes taking place.
At the same time, the influence of regression and backlash to the emergence of these new worldviews cannot be underestimated. Part of the empowerment of more traditional worldviews in the last decade or two may be explained by that mechanism, as argued here.