1. Understanding The Chinese
Personality
Your name: Diane Guo
Your homeroom: 10H
Your supervisor’s name: Ms. Degreef
Your school: BISS International School
Year: 2013/1/31
Word count: 1728 words

2. Table of Contents
My Goal page 3
Selection of Sources page 4
Application of Information page 4
Achieving my Goal page 5
Reflection on Learning page 6
Bibliography page 7

3. My Goal
My Personal Project topic was to understand the Chinese personality and the Chineseway of thinking by
looking at from different aspects.
This topic wasn’t my original topic. The first topic I came up with was Understanding Chinese People
Through Chinese Characters. The reason why my topic changedduring this time was because as I
researchedmore and more about the first topic, I found out that it was impossible to understand the Chinese
people only by looking at the characters. I made a wrong assumption for my first topic; therefore I changed
my topic to Understanding How the Chinese Thinks Through Different Aspects. However, the first topic
wasn’t completely a waste of time for me becauseI learned some things about the personality and the
characteristics of the Chinese people, which became useful to my second topic.
I wanted to show that the Chinese people like to keep things balanced; yet they act ambiguous. I tried to
look for evidence of this through all different fields, and finally decided that Chinese food, Chinese
medicine, and Chinese instruments can confirm my point the best.
The AOI (area of interaction) that I focusedupon were Approaches To Learning and Human Ingenuity. The
reason for approaches to learning is that I am learning lots of new knowledge throughout the process; this
project is benefiting myself in many different ways.Also, this project helped me in my management and
organizational skills because I only limited time to organize every information I got, and to put them into a
final product. I had to as well manage my time properly, for meeting with my supervisor as many times as
possible and for keeping the progress of my project. It is as well connected to human ingenuity because how
people think is equivalent to how human use their ingenuity to overcome problems when they have. In my
project, I will explain why Chinese people invented or created certain things, certain rules. Chinese does
things differently from every other culture in the world, and I believe there is a reason behind to explain it.
My original goal for my personal project was to let people know more about the Chinese people by just
looking at the Chinese characters. However, since I changed my topic, my goal was thenabout finding out
and understanding how Chinese people think and act, so that foreigners can understand the Chinese culture
and Chinese people better, therefore have a better relationship with the Chinese people.
To measure whether my project is successful or not, I need comments from a variety of people. First of all, I
will need my supervisor’s opinion on whether I did a good job on the whole process of my project. Next, I
will ask other students and teachers whether they think I did my project successfully, and give some
feedbacks. Above all, the most important feedback I need is from the common Chinese people who live in
Beijing or any part of China. It is important to get their opinion on my project, because since my topic is

4. how the Chinese people think, if they agree with my conclusion, then it means that my project was
successful.
Selection of Sources
The sources I used were Internet sources, books and interviewing people. Those sources helped me a lot.
The books I read gave me the thought of changing my topic, because although it was a book about
characters, it talked more about how the characters are more related to people’sway of thinking and acting.
It made me wonder if my topic is really meaningful. Interviewing my parents and other family members was
very helpful to me, because they are more “Chinese” than me, and they know more facts about the Chinese
culture. They told me about the difference between the Chinese culture and the Western culture, and gave
me examples of how I can prove my point, which I had to provethat Chinese people like balance and do not
mind ambiguity. The Internet helped me to find more specific examples and images that will make my point
even stronger.
Application of Information
From the sources I used, I learned about the history of Characters and how they were formed. It is more
relative with my old topic, but I used what I learned from the characters which is to keep every components
balanced, in to my new topic. It gave me the inspiration of Chinese people like to have a balanced life and
relationship with things around them. By reading about Confucius and learning about his Confucianism, I
discovered the reason why Chinese people have the habit of being ambiguous. In Confucianism, it promote
people not to achieve the best they can, never try to be different from others, be average or below average.
With these kinds of ideas in mind, it is easy to imagine why Chinese people make low quality products and
do things in an ambiguous way.
Some questions had come up to me along my research, but they help me to think further on my topic.
During my research, I was wondering if I can find any further evidence or proofs that can prove my point is
correct. I didn’t know where to look at for more evidence, and what can I use as a piece of evidence. I had a
question, whether the idea of Confucianism can be showed or reflected through an ordinary behavior or
invention of Chinese people.
To solve these problems, I started looking at ordinary things in life, and tried to find what is unordinary
about them. By looking at food, which is something we all see every single day, I discovered that it is a very
typical example of ambiguity. I also asked my parents, who are more “Chinese” than I am. They told me
about the Chinese medicine, and how balance and ambiguous can be shown. Later on, my supervisor
reminded me about a website we studied in Humanities class. It is a website providing information on
different culture. On that website it says:

5. “At 30 China has a low score on uncertainty avoidance. Truth may be relative though in the immediate
social circles there is concern for Truth with a capital T and rules (but not necessarily laws)
abound. Nonetheless, adherence to laws and rules may be flexible to suit the actual situation and
pragmatism is a fact of life. The Chinese are comfortable with ambiguity; the Chinese language is full of
ambiguous meanings that can be difficult for Western people to follow. Chinese are adaptable and
entrepreneurial. At the time of writing the majority (70% -80%) of Chinese businesses tend to be small to
medium sized and family owned.”
This information is very helpful to me, it proves that I have made a reasonable point, and I actually have
proofs that I can back it up with.
Achieving my Goal
My original idea of my final product was to make a flash video showing my project. However, after I did
some investigations about the Flash, I figured that to learn how to use it will take me way to long, and I have
to spend so much time on learning how to use it, so I decided it wasn’t worth to learn how to use Flash.
Since a lot of explanations are required in my final product, I think making a power point would be a good
idea. I put everything I have found during the last 6 months into the power point, and wrote a lot of
explanations for it.
I believe that my product is quite successful, against the specifications of success. First, I organized the
power point in a reasonable order, so that when people look at it they can follow through easily. Secondly, I
added pictures on the appropriate places, which will make the slide more amusing to look at. Next, I believe
that I have explained all my points very clearly and adequately. I am aware of power points are not suppose
to be full of words, but since I can not do the explanations in person by myself, I have to write down
everything I want people to know. Finally, I use a different font on every first letter of a paragraph, and also

6. on words that I want to highlight, so that people can pay more attention to those words, and at the same time
is more interested in my explanations. So overall, I believe that my final product is well made and succeeded.
Reflection on Learning
I got to know the Chinese people even better, even though I am Chinese myself. With my supervisor, I
learned how to think deeper into a question, and to always question myself if I can still improve my
statement. I learned how to use the resources around me, for example my family, friends, and to observe into
every detail. About human ingenuity, I learned that Chinese people enjoy having their lives balanced, and do
things ambiguously. Food, medicine and instrument are all examples of evidence that can prove my point.
The two AOI topics that I focused on were Approaches To Learning, and Human Ingenuity. By doing this
project I learned more about these two topics. First of all, for ATL, I learned to use as much resources
around me as possible. Sometimes human resource is better than online resources. Also I learned to manage
my time correctly, in able to have a high efficiency. For Human Ingenuity, I learned that tradition can effect
people a lot and in many different ways. One reason for why we create is to produce a more comfortable life
style for people to live in, and we create things differently from place to place because we want people in
that area to feel more use to it. An answer to how we create is to look deeply into one’s culture, get the
essence from that culture, and mix in to what you are creating. That way, not only the product will be more
popular, customers will also be happier to purchase the product.
I consider myself being a risk taker, because I chose a topic that nobody has studied before, it is very hard
for me to research into the topic. Most of the evidence and examples were originally from myself, so it was
quite challenging for me.

7. Bibliography
Books:
Han, Jiantang. Han zi wen huatushuo = The culture of Chinese characters with illustrations by pictures. Di
1 ban.ed. Beijing: Beijing yuyan da xuechu ban she, 2005. Print.
Lindqvist, Cecilia. Han ziwang guo: jiangshuZhongguoren he ta men de Han zi de gushi. Di 1 ban.ed. Jinan
Shi: Shandong huabaochupanshe, 1998. Print.
Internet:
Confucianism. Baidubaike.com. Dec 6 2012. http://baike.baidu.com/view/4111.htm
Jeffrey Hays, Character and people. Facts and details.com. Nov. 26 2012.
http://factsanddetails.com/china.php?itemid=116&catid=4&subcatid=18
Jeffrey Hays, Chinese personality and character: Confucianism, Asian values, communism and nationalism.
Facts and details.com. Nov 30 2012.
http://factsanddetails.com/china.php?itemid=117&catid=4&subcatid=18
Jeffrey Hays, Written Chinese: history, oracle bones, pinyin and reforms. Facts and details.com Nov 30
2012.http://factsanddetails.com/china.php?itemid=124&catid=4&subcatid=16
Unknown. China - Geert Hofstede.Cultural Insights - Geert Hofstede.2013. <http://geert-
hofstede.com/china.html>.
The most common Chinese characters." FamilieZein. 4 Jan. 2013. http://www.zein.se/patrick/3000char.html
Travels: The Chinese Personality.Travels. 31 Dec. 2013. <http://archr-
travels.blogspot.com/2007/09/chinese-personality.html>.