Rabat — Integrity ranks first among the values Moroccans want to transmit to their children, according to new findings from Morocco’s 2025 National Family Survey.

The High Commission for Planning (HCP) released the survey’s first results in April after questioning a representative sample of 14,000 households across Morocco’s urban and rural areas.

When respondents were asked which values should be passed to children, 33.9% placed integrity and probity first. Respect for family values and roles followed at 26%, while 12.1% cited a sense of responsibility toward family and society.

Faith and religious attachment accounted for 8.9% of responses. The figure stood at 11.1% in rural areas and 7.8% in cities, according to the HCP’s full report on the findings.

The ranking does not show that religion has become unimportant in Moroccan family life. The survey did not measure religious belief or practice through this question.

What it does show is that, when respondents were asked to prioritize what they wanted the next generation to inherit, qualities tied to conduct came first.

Integrity, responsibility, and family obligations together account for nearly three-quarters of the responses.

What Moroccans look for in a partner

A similar pattern appears when unmarried Moroccans describe what matters in choosing a future spouse.

The HCP report shows that moral values and responsibility rank first, cited by 44.7% of unmarried respondents.

That category includes fidelity, trust, support, empathy, and responsibility.

Psycho-affective qualities came second at 21.2%. The HCP defines these as emotional compatibility, love, understanding, communication, and mutual respect.

Socioeconomic considerations accounted for 12.9%, followed by religiosity at 11.5% and intellectual compatibility at 7.3%.

Those numbers offer a more interesting picture than a simple divide between “traditional” and “modern” Morocco.

Moral character remains dominant, but the qualities used to judge a potential spouse increasingly include how two people communicate, understand each other, and function together.

Change without abandoning the family

The wider survey nevertheless shows that traditional family structures remain influential.

The HCP describes Moroccan family life as undergoing significant transformation, including smaller households, changing marital patterns, and a gradual decline in extended-family cohabitation. At the same time, it stresses that the family continues to play a central role in social solidarity and the transmission of values.

That tension may be the more revealing story behind the statistics.

Moroccans are not necessarily replacing family or religious values with an entirely different moral framework. Instead, the survey suggests that many are defining a good child or partner through qualities visible in everyday behavior: honesty, reliability, responsibility, communication, and mutual respect.

The figures point less to a rejection of inherited values than to an evolving understanding of how those values should be practiced inside Moroccan families.