Japanese Stereotypes Debunked

Japan, a country often associated with delicate gardens, refined haikus and Buddhist inner peace, now has internal conflict up the yin-yang.

David Matsumoto, an SF State psychology professor and director of the Culture and Emotion Research Laboratory, said the conflict is between an older Japanese generation who have a “psychic investment” in preserving stereotypes and the younger generation who want to define themselves in a completely new way.

“The old culture exists with the new, that’s why it’s kind of a mess,” said Matsumoto, who’s out to set the record straight in his latest book, “The New Japan: Debunking Seven Cultural Stereotypes.” The book looks at America’s numerous misconceptions about the island nation.

Matsumoto, 43, who is third-generation Japanese, writes that old stereotypes about the Japanese fail to sum up a modern Japan that is undergoing massive and dividing cultural changes. He comes from a very conservative family that still believes in the values of Japan from 100 years ago, when his grandparents first immigrated. While travelling in mmigrated. While traveling in Japan he noticed that modern Japanese were actually far more liberal than his family. He later looked at studies and found that many Asian immigrants are more traditional than those still living in Asia, because their values are dated from the time they came over.

Matsumoto decided to write the book because he felt modern psychology was doing increasing numbers of studies and theories based on stereotypic premises of Japanese culture, and these studies were perpetuating the stereotypes. He stresses that the stereotypes were never true in the first place and have even less value now.

“Psychology is supposed to foster understanding between individuals, but what we’ve been doing is keeping each other different,” said Matsumoto, who based the book on a combination of his studies and data collected from other scientists.

He found that Japan is in a state of unrest.

“The causes, in fact, are multiple and include political, social, economic, and psychological factors, all of which interact to produce a unique experience for Japanese individuals — the blending of traditional and contemporary characteristics of society,” Matsumoto wrote in his book.

The mass of social changes that occurred in Japan after World War II, the huge economic growth and affluence of the 1970s and 1980s and the autonomy that comes with wealth, has made the younger generation question why they should do the same as their parents, Matsumoto said.

“I agree that Japanese international students are more individualistic. They like to go out in groups but they have different interests from each other,” said Jung-Wook Choi, a Korean graduate student at San Jose State University who attended Matsumoto’s lecture on the “The New Japan.”

Choi said the lecture made her think twice about her old image of the Japanese as being “kind, sincere, smiling all the time, bowing, never loud, always quiet.”

While the stereotypes are especially not true for today’s youth, Japan has also been heterogeneous in the past.

“A growing number of academics think America had a political role and goal in promulgating these stereotypes against the Japanese culture even though they didn’t think it was true,” Matsumoto said. “That was in order to make Japan more like an American colony instead of an independent country. Japan never goes against what America wants.”

With all the products that are exported from Japan, Matsumoto said most Americans see it as a pure model of capitalism, when internally Japan has a very socialistic system.

“But the people who are individuals are fighting, bucking with this socialistic system. There’s a discrepancy between what they are and what they are trying to become,” Matsumoto said.

“When you look at Japanese woman under 40, there’s a lot less acceptance of servant roles and more an acceptance of separate roles with independent duties. Japanese woman are making their own money, marrying later and having less kids,” he says of the 2lst century Japanese women.

Of modern Japanese men he said, “They have a lot more resources than they did in the past. They are likely to have interesting and diverse thoughts. They would still be hesitant to speak (these thoughts) up in general. But compared to the past, they are more willing to do so. Plus they are more creative and adventurous.”

The response to his book has been positive, and Matsumoto is often asked to speak to Japanese businesses and organizations that work with Japan.

“Unfortunately I don’t have too many answers as far to the solutions in business, but I do have some understanding about what would be necessary for the needed social changes in Japan.”

Right now, he feels the big question is “what do we do about it?” He felt Americans and everyone else need to have a healthier attitude toward stereotypes because there is no homogeneous society anywhere.

Sydnie Yoo, a Korean who attended Matsumoto’s lecture on the book said she was surprised to find out this semester that Koreans are generalized to be fiery and outgoing. She said that’s not correct, but there’s a germ of truth to it and she doesn’t blame people for generalizing. Thinking about her own stereotype made it easier to look at the Japanese on a person-to-person basis.

“I always lumped Japan and Korea together,” said Yoo, a psychology major. “In my head I think Japan is more similar to Korea than the United States. But it’s more individualistic than I thought.”