Figure skater Alysa Liu bites her medal at the Winter Olympics in Milan on Feb. 19.  The positive response to Liu’s performances illustrates how American culture values “high arousal positive states.” 

I once interviewed for a job, and after talking to my would-be boss and being shown around the office, I was intrigued about working there.

As the interview was ending, however, my would-be boss said, “I can tell you’re not that interested.”

I assured him that I was indeed interested, but I must not have been that persuasive because I didn’t get the job. Granted, my would-be boss knew my background as a journalist, and this job was not in journalism, so he could have reasoned that I wouldn’t like the work.

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Or, perhaps the would-be boss was turned off by what he viewed as my stoic expression, however unintentional it was. That’s what research from Stanford University psychology Professor Jeanne Tsai suggests, and it’s the topic of her Open Forum on Thursday.

Tsai has spent over two decades studying the “ideal affect,” the emotional states that people want to feel and how that varies in different cultures. 

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In her Open Forum, Tsai uses the overwhelming positive response to Olympic figure skating champion Alysa Liu to illustrate how American culture values “high arousal positive states.” Americans are more likely to perceive the joy exuded by Liu as favorable than people from East Asian countries and cultures.

“The American public reaction to Liu was a clear reflection of how much we value excitement,” Tsai told me in an email.

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The U.S. is a more individualistic culture, while East Asian cultures tend to be more collectivistic. 

“These differences are reflected in the media, institutions and practices of these countries,” Tsai said.

What are the implications of this? 

“If I think you are friendly, I’ll talk to and engage with you more, and when I have an opportunity to share resources with you, I will,” Tsai told me. “If I think you are cold and hostile, however, I’ll avoid talking to and engaging with you.”

All this might influence stereotypes in the U.S. about East Asians as being “inscrutable,” “stoic” and “robotic,” Tsai said, part of the “bamboo ceiling” that negatively affects their prospects for jobs and promotions. 

“I think this reflects the American emphasis on excitement and other high-arousal positive states,” she said. “Americans who hold these stereotypes about East Asians and East Asian Americans are misreading East Asian expressions of calm as lacking emotion.”

So, by playing it cool during that job interview as an East Asian American, I crossed signals with a would-be boss, which I realized even before learning about Tsai’s research. Since then, I’ve made it a point to smile more — and I got an even better job here at the Chronicle.

Read Tsai’s Open Forum.

Exclusive interview with S.F. Mayor Lurie 

My colleague Emily Hoeven talked to San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie about why he won’t stop interacting with people on the streets — even after a member of his police detail got into a violent altercation with a man in the Tenderloin. A video of the incident went viral.

Among other things, Lurie told Hoeven he planned to continue his spontaneous street check-ins, often with people in distress.

“We all need to be out and about and seeing what our small business owners are going through and what our families and our children are going through. … Our elders have to walk down those streets, too,” Lurie said.

Guest opinions in Open Forum and Insight are produced by writers with expertise, personal experience or original insights on a subject of interest to our readers. Their views do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Chronicle editorial board, which is committed to providing a diversity of ideas to our readership.

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