亞裔美國人爲何如此成功 The Asian Advantage
THIS is an awkward question, but here goes: Why are Asian-Americans so successful in America?
爲什麼亞裔在美國如此成功？這個問題有點尷尬。
It’s no secret that Asian-Americans are disproportionately stars in American schools, and even in American society as a whole. Census data show that Americans of Asian heritage earn more than other groups, including whites. Asian-Americans also have higher educational attainment than any other group.
在美國的學校裏，亞裔表現優異的比例格外地高，就連在整個美國社會中也是如此。人口普查數據顯示，亞裔的收入高於包括白人在內的其他羣體。而且亞裔的教育程度也比其他任何羣體都高。
I wrote a series of columns last year, “When Whites Just Don’t Get It,” about racial inequity, and one of the most common responses from angry whites was along these lines: This stuff about white privilege is nonsense, and if blacks lag, the reason lies in the black community itself. Just look at Asian-Americans. Those Koreans and Chinese make it in America because they work hard. All people can succeed here if they just stop whining and start working.
我去年寫了一個關於種族不平等現象的系列專欄，題爲“白人就是不明白”，一些白人讀者憤怒地予以駁斥，其中最常見的回覆大意是：白人擁有特權的說法真是一派胡言，如果黑人落後了，原因在於黑人社區本身。只要看看亞裔就知道了。韓裔和華裔在美國獲得了成功，因爲他們在努力。黑人只要停止抱怨，開始努力，所有人都可以在這裏獲得成功。
Let’s confront the argument head-on. Does the success of Asian-Americans suggest that the age of discrimination is behind us?
讓我們直面這個論點吧。亞裔的成功是否昭示着歧視的年代已經成爲過去？
A new scholarly book, “The Asian American Achievement Paradox,” by Jennifer Lee and Min Zhou, notes that Asian-American immigrants in recent decades have started with one advantage: They are highly educated, more so even than the average American. These immigrants are disproportionately doctors, research scientists and other highly educated professionals.
在新出版的學術著作《亞裔美國人成就的悖論》(The Asian American Achievement Paradox)中，作者珍妮弗·李(Jennifer Lee)和周敏注意到，美國亞裔移民近幾十年來開始獲得一項優勢：他們的教育水平很高，甚至比美國人的平均學歷還高。這些移民成爲醫生、科研人員，或從事其他高學歷專業崗位的比例格外地高。
It’s not surprising that the children of Asian-American doctors would flourish in the United States. But Lee and Zhou note that kids of working-class Asian-Americans often also thrive, showing remarkable upward mobility.
亞裔醫生的子女在美國表現出色，這倒並不令人驚訝。但兩位作者注意到，工薪階級亞裔的孩子往往也表現出色，展現出了非同一般的向上流動性。
And let’s just get one notion out of the way: The difference does not seem to be driven by differences in intelligence.
我們首先要說的一個觀點是：這種差異似乎並不是智力差異造成的。
Richard Nisbett, a professor of psychology who has written an excellent book about intelligence, cites a study that followed a pool of Chinese-American children and a pool of white children into adulthood. The two groups started out with the same scores on I.Q. tests, but in the end 55 percent of the Asian-Americans entered high-status occupations, compared with one-third of the whites. To succeed as a manager, whites needed an I.Q. of 100, while Chinese-Americans needed an I.Q. of only 93.
心理學家理查德·尼斯比特(Richard Nisbett)寫過一本有關智力的著作，書中提到了一項研究。該研究追蹤了一羣華裔孩子和白人孩子從小到大的情況。一開始，兩個小組在智商測試中的得分是一樣的，但到最後，55%的亞裔進入了地位較高的職業，相比之下白人的比例僅爲三分之一。要想成爲一名成功的管理人員，白人的智商需要達到100，而華裔只需達到93。
So the Asian advantage, Nisbett argues, isn’t intellectual firepower as such, but how it is harnessed.
尼斯比特據此認爲，亞裔的優勢不是智力本身，而是如何利用智力。
Some disagree, but I’m pretty sure that one factor is East Asia’s long Confucian emphasis on education. Likewise, a focus on education also helps explain the success of Jews, who are said to have had universal male literacy 1,700 years before any other group.
一些人不同意這個觀點，但我確信，其中一個因素在於東亞儒學長期以來對教育的強調。同樣，對教育的重視也有助於解釋猶太人的成功。據稱，猶太男性普遍識字的時間比其他羣體早了1700年。
Immigrant East Asians often try particularly hard to get into good school districts, or make other sacrifices for children’s education, such as giving prime space in the home to kids to study.
東亞移民通常竭盡全力地進入好學區，或爲了孩子的教育做出其他犧牲，比如將家裏最好的地方讓給孩子學習。
There’s also evidence that Americans believe that A’s go to smart kids, while Asians are more likely to think that they go to hard workers. The truth is probably somewhere in between, but the result is that Asian-American kids are allowed no excuse for getting B’s — or even an A-. The joke is that an A- is an “Asian F.”
還有證據顯示美國人認爲聰明的孩子會得到A，而亞裔更多地認爲努力的人才會得到A。事實很可能介於兩者之間，但結果是亞裔孩子沒有拿B、乃至拿A-的藉口。有人開玩笑稱，A-相當於“亞洲的F”。
Strong two-parent families are a factor, too. Divorce rates are much lower for many Asian-American communities than for Americans as a whole, and there’s evidence that two-parent households are less likely to sink into poverty and also have better outcomes for boys in particular.
穩固的雙親家庭也是一個因素。很多亞裔羣體的離婚率比全美的均值低得多，有證據顯示雙親家庭陷入貧困的可能性較低，尤其對於男孩來說，成就還會更高。
Teachers’ expectations can also play a role. This idea was explored in a famous experiment in the 1960s by Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson.
老師的期待也會發揮作用。羅伯特·羅森塔爾(Robert Rosenthal)和莉諾·雅各布森(Lenore Jacobson)在60年代做的著名實驗就探索了這一觀點。
After conducting I.Q. tests of students at a California school, the experimenters told the teachers the names of one-fifth of the children who they said were special, and expected to soar. These special students in first and second grades improved dramatically. A year later, 47 percent of them had gained 20 or more I.Q. points.
在對加利福尼亞的一所學校的學生進行了智商測試後，實驗人員告知老師五分之一的學生的名字。他們稱這些學生很特殊，有可觀的上升空間。結果，一二年級的特殊學生有顯著提高。一年之後，其中47%的學生的智商提高了至少20分。
Yet in truth, the special students were chosen at random. This “Pygmalion effect” was a case of self-fulfilling expectations. Teachers had higher expectations for the special students and made them feel capable — and so that’s what they became.
但實際上，特殊學生是隨機選擇的。這種“皮格馬利翁效應”(Pygmalion Effect)是一個體現自我實現預期的例子。教師對特殊學生的期待較高，讓他們感覺自己有能力，於是他們最終變得能幹起來。
Lee and Zhou, for their part, think that positive stereotyping may be part of an explanation for the success of Asian-Americans in school.
珍妮弗·李和周敏認爲這種正面的刻板印象可能是亞裔在學業上取得成功的原因之一。
“They’re like, ‘Oh, you’re Chinese and you’re good in math,’” the book quotes a girl called Angela as saying. “It’s advantageous when they think that.”
“他們表現得像是，‘哦，你是華人，你的數學很好，’”該書援引名爲安吉拉(Angela)的女孩的話說。“他們這樣想的時候會對我有利。”
(Of course, positive stereotypes create their own burden, with sometimes tremendous stress on children to earn those A’s, at the cost of enjoying childhood. And it can be hard on Asian-American kids whose comparative advantage isn’t in science or math but in theater or punk rock. Among Asians, there’s sometimes concern that there’s too much focus on memorization, not enough on creativity.)
（當然，正面的刻板印象會帶來負擔，孩子們有時會承受得A的巨大壓力，無法享受童年時光。它還會讓那些在戲劇或朋克搖滾方面而不是科學或數學方面具有相對優勢的亞裔學生處境艱難。亞裔當中有時也會擔心他們過多地側重背誦，對創造性重視不足。）
Another factor in Asian scholastic success may be the interaction of social stereotypes and self-confidence. Scholars like Claude Steele have found that blacks sometimes suffer from “stereotype threat”: Anxiety from negative stereotypes impairs performance. Lee and Zhou argue that Asian-Americans sometimes ride on the opposite of “stereotype threat,” a “stereotype promise” that they will be smart and hard-working.
亞裔取得學業成功的另一個因素可能是社會刻板印象和自信的相互作用。克勞德·斯蒂爾(Claude Steele)等學者發現，黑人有時遭受“刻板印象威脅”：消極刻板印象帶來的焦慮會削弱表現。珍妮弗·李和周敏認爲，亞裔有時會受益於“刻板印象威脅”的對立面——認爲他們聰明又努力的“刻板印象期望。
Lee and Zhou also say the success of Asian-Americans, far from revealing a lack of discrimination, is in part a testament to it. They say Asian-Americans work hard to succeed in areas with clear metrics like math and science in part as a protection against bias — and in any case, many Asians still perceive a “bamboo ceiling” that is hard to break through.
珍妮弗·李和周敏還表示，亞裔的成功遠未說明不存在歧視，而是在一定程度上證明了歧視的存在。他們表示，亞裔努力在數學和科學等具有清晰衡量標準的領域取得成功，有一部分原因就是爲了避免遭到歧視——在任何情況下，很多亞裔仍然感覺有難以衝破的“竹子天花板”。
To me, the success of Asian-Americans is a tribute to hard work, strong families and passion for education. Bravo! Ditto for the success of Jews, West Indians and other groups that have shown that upward mobility is possible, but let’s not exaggerate the lessons here.
在我看來，亞裔的成功歸功於他們自身的努力、穩固的家庭和對教育的投入。太棒了！猶太人、西印度羣島人和展示出向上流動性可能的其他羣體的成功是類似的，但不要誇大這種經驗。
Why should the success of the children of Asian doctors, nurtured by teachers, be reassuring to a black boy in Baltimore who is raised by a struggling single mom, whom society regards as a potential menace? Disadvantage and marginalization are complex, often deeply rooted in social structures and unconscious biases, sometimes compounded by hopelessness and self-destructive behaviors, and because one group can access the American dream does not mean that all groups can.
亞裔醫生的子女在老師的培養下取得的成功怎麼會給巴爾的摩地區由苦苦掙扎的單身母親養大的、被社會視作潛在威脅的黑人男孩帶來信心？這種劣勢和邊緣化的情況非常複雜，通常深深紮根於社會結構和無意識的偏見之中，有時會由於自我毀滅的絕望行爲而變得更糟，因爲一個羣體可以實現美國夢並不意味着所有羣體都可以。
So, sure, let’s celebrate the success of Asian-Americans, and emulate the respect for education and strong families. But let’s not use the success of Asians to pat ourselves on the back and pretend that discrimination is history.
因此，讓我們慶祝亞裔取得的成功，效仿他們對教育和穩固家庭的尊重。但不要用他們的成功來自我安慰，假裝歧視已經成爲歷史。
