Personal ValuesValues Research & Tools

Personal value statistics: Ethics

Ethics appeared in the ranked ten of 15.5% of the 2,099,004 assessments completed since 2020, which makes it the 26th most frequently ranked of the 62 core values.

What ethics means as a value →

At a glance, 2020 to 2026

Appearance rateof assessments rank it in their ten. 26th of 62 values.
15.5%
First placeof assessments put it first. 20th of 62 on this measure.
1.6%
Top threeof assessments put it in the top three. 27% of those who rank it.
4.2%
Average positionis its mean position, out of ten, where it is ranked at all.
6.0

In the overall ranking ethics sits just below Wisdom (15.6%) and just above Meaningful work (15.2%).

How the Popularity of Ethics Has Changed

In 2020 ethics appeared in 17.9% of assessments and ranked 21st. In 2026 so far it appeared in 12.6% and ranked 39th, a fall of 5.3 percentage points.

Pick a measure, and read it by year or month by month. A month holds a few thousand assessments, so it moves more than a year does. The gaps are months the archive has no data for.

Ethics, year by year

Each rank is among the 62 values that year, by appearance rate. The arrow is its move from the year before.

Ethics by year: assessments, appearance rate and rank, first place, top three and average position
YearAssessmentsAppearance rateRankFirst placeTop threeAverage position
202084,37817.9%21st1.9%4.7%6.1
2021224,09617.2%22nd▼11.7%4.3%6.2
2022179,27116.2%25th▼31.5%3.9%6.3
2023397,24916.8%24th▲11.5%4.1%6.2
2024460,24416.5%26th▼21.5%4.0%6.3
2025449,23313.8%30th▼41.5%4.0%5.8
2026 so far304,53312.6%39th▼91.7%4.7%5.0

2020 holds 6 months of data and 2022 holds 7 months of data, so their figures cover part of the year. 2026 covers January to September 2026.

Ethics by Country

Of the 25 countries with enough assessments to publish, participants in Brazil rank ethics most often, at 24.9%, and those in Poland least often, at 9.7%.

Country is recorded for the assessments from December 2025 to September 2026, so this section reads those 272,982 assessments and compares each country with all of them.

Where ethics is ranked most often

12.9% of participants rank ethics in their top ten, from 24.9% in Brazil to 9.7% in Poland. Tap or hover a country to see its top values.

  • 9–12%
  • 12–14%
  • 14–17%
  • 17–20%
  • 20–22%
  • 22–25%
  • too few assessments
Appearance rate of ethics by country, December 2025 to September 2026
CountryAppearance ratevs average (pp)Rank there
Brazil
24.9%
+12.011th of 62
Saudi Arabia
16.5%
+3.625th of 62
Egypt
16.4%
+3.527th of 62
United Arab Emirates
16.0%
+3.125th of 62
South Africa
15.8%
+2.824th of 62
India
15.6%
+2.725th of 62
Mexico
14.5%
+1.531st of 62
United Kingdom
14.3%
+1.428th of 62
Germany
13.8%
+0.931st of 62
Australia
13.5%
+0.533rd of 62
Italy
13.3%
+0.433rd of 62
Canada
13.2%
+0.333rd of 62
Singapore
12.7%
−0.236th of 62
Indonesia
12.6%
−0.340th of 62
United States
12.6%
−0.337th of 62
Romania
12.5%
−0.435th of 62
Switzerland
12.4%
−0.537th of 62
Netherlands
11.8%
−1.139th of 62
France
11.7%
−1.234th of 62
New Zealand
11.5%
−1.440th of 62
Ireland
11.2%
−1.740th of 62
Philippines
10.4%
−2.540th of 62
Malaysia
10.3%
−2.649th of 62
Hong Kong SAR China
9.8%
−3.243rd of 62
Poland
9.7%
−3.239th of 62

Every assessment with a known country, 12.9%

Ethics by Age

Ethics is ranked more often with age, from 9.9% of assessments among participants under 18 to 14.4% among those 65 and over, about 1.9 points per band.

Age is an optional question after the ranking, so this section reads the 66,624 assessments from December 2025 to September 2026 whose participants gave one. A difference between bands mixes what changes as people age with what differs between generations.

Appearance rate of ethics by age band, December 2025 to September 2026
AgeAppearance ratevs average (pp)Rank there
Under 18
9.9%
−5.346th of 62
18–24
14.6%
−0.630th of 62
25–34
16.1%
+0.825th of 62
35–44
18.0%
+2.723rd of 62
45–54
19.3%
+4.019th of 62
55–64
20.7%
+5.419th of 62
65 and over
14.4%
−0.927th of 62

Everyone who gave an age, 15.3%

Ethics by Gender

Women and men rank ethics almost equally often, at 15.3% and 15.0%.

Gender is optional too, asked beside age, so this section reads the 64,656 assessments from December 2025 to September 2026 whose participants gave one. “Prefer not to say” is counted in no group.

Appearance rate of ethics by gender, December 2025 to September 2026
GenderAppearance ratevs average (pp)Rank there
Women
15.3%
−0.023rd of 62
Men
15.0%
−0.326th of 62
Non-binary
21.5%
+6.217th of 62

Everyone who gave a gender, 15.3%

About These Figures

Every figure on this page is a share of completed assessments on Personalvalu.es, read from the same aggregates as the Global Values Research. The appearance rate is how often ethics is among a participant's ten most important values. It is not a score, and a difference between groups describes the participants in them without explaining it.

How the aggregates are built, and why some countries and groups are left out, is set out in the methodology. Month-by-month figures for every value are in the monthly archive.

Statistics for every value

Where does ethics stand among your own values? Rank your own values.

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