Dave Pollard is asking some interesting questions about the collective values of countries, comparing The United States and Canada. While I bristle at the idea of collective values for an entire country, the discussion is interesting nonetheless.

Dave is talking about a survey conducted by Michael Adams, author of Fire & Ice: The US, Canada and the Myth of Converging Values. Mr. Adams' findings suggest that America's shared values are moving toward survival roles and deference to authority, while Canada's shared values are moving toward idealism and individual fulfillment.

Mr. Adams has created a web site that allows you to take part of the survey used to generate statistics for his book. Here is how I placed on the spectrum:

But putting on my social psychology hat, I'm not sure those questions were sufficient to place anyone accurately on a spectrum. I understand that the actual survey was much longer, which would tend to increase its accuracy.