Social values form an important part of the culture of the society. Values account for the stability of social order. They provide the general guidelines for social conduct. Values such as fundamental rights, patriotism, respect for human dignity, rationality, sacrifice, individuality, equality, democracy etc. guide our behaviour in many ways. Values are the criteria people use in assessing their daily lives; arrange their priorities and choosing between alternative course of action.

In simple words, values may be defined as measure of goodness or desirability. Values are standards of social behaviour derived from social interaction and accepted as constituent facts of social structure. They are objects that social conditions desire. These are culturally defined goals and involve “sentiments and significance.” These consist of “aspirational reference.”Values are expected to be followed for judging and evaluating social interaction, goals, means, ideas, feelings and the expected conduct. Without such evaluating standard, it would be difficult to judge individual behaviour or social action. Values aim to integrate expected individual behaviour and social action. It tends to forestall tension and as such have tension management role.

Norms and values have salient relation. Norms are specific, values are not. There may be, in a particular situation, delusion of norms, but values are commanding. Norms are rules for behaving: they say more or less specifically what should or should not be done by particular types of actors in given circumstances. Values are standard of desirability that are more nearly independent of specific situations. The same value may be a point of reference for a great many specific norms; a particular norm may represent the simultaneous application of several separable values. Thus, the value premise “equality” may enter into norms for relationships between husband and wife, brother and brother, teacher and student and so on.