Eighth order perceptions - control of principles

This is the order of morality, responsibility and values, where concepts such as good and bad, moral and immoral, just and unjust, are necessary if one's conflicting needs are to be satisfied. Rather than fixed behaviour in response to a given situation, with an inbuilt programme saying when to procreate, when to turn out the young on their own as an animal has, man can (although he does not always) step outside the programme in response to his own needs. This is the level of making value judgements, it is also the order at which conflicts arise. If each side in a conflicting decision is of equal value then there can be no satisfactory resolution.

The eighth of ten orders in the perceptual system described by William Glasser.