Are you affected by ethnicity?

Are you affected in any way by the ethnicity of people you don't know (or don't know well) and with whom you interact in your everyday life?

Originally posted by FMF
Are you affected in any way by the ethnicity of people you don't know (or don't know well) and with whom you interact in your everyday life?

Not at all. Should I be? I do notice a language or cultural problem occasionally but that's just a language or cultural difference, nothing to do with country of birth, ancestry or domicile.

Are you affected by ethnicity?

Originally posted by Kewpie
Not at all. Should I be?

No, I don't think so, but maybe I am. I'm currently cogitating it.

I read this letter in the 5th March edition of The Economist:

Dear Sir,

It is true: diversity undermines trust (Schumpeter, February 13th see http://tinyurl.com/zwqql9h ). But this may be its greatest gift. When ethnically different others are present, people tend to remain cautious, scrutinise information and reach better decisions.

Our research, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, showed that ethnically diverse markets are significantly less likely to bubble compared with homogenous ones.

The results held for North America and South-East Asia, notwithstanding the differences in culture, history and ethnic composition.

In homogenous markets, we reason, trust in other people’s reasonableness can cause erroneous beliefs to spread more readily. Diversity makes you better precisely because it makes you less trusting.

PROFESSOR SHEEN LEVINE
The University of Texas, Dallas

It struck me as an interesting question for people to ask themselves - but, because I could not be sure people were asking themselves, I decided to do it for them! 😛

Thanks for your answer.

Diversity makes things more interesting. If I can't predict what the other person will do next, I'm going to be more alert than if the outcome is totally predictable.

The Economist.