Um... China is a big place and there's a whole lot of differences between regions and generations. This is just from personal observations, no necessarily based on any statistics or studies:
For the older generation, Northern Chinese are taller and less lactose intolerant vs. Southern Chinese. You can attribute this to diet, genetics, whatever. I have a couple of older Northern Chinese coworkers who are 6' to 6'1", versus those from Hong Kong are all shorter. For the younger generation, due to better diet and nutrition, they're all getting taller so the height difference might not be as wide in the future.
The ethnic Chinese living in Malaysia has retained their traditional ways far better than those in China, HK, or Taiwan. These are usually of Southern Chinese stock (Teochow, Hakka, etc.) and still perform many old rituals. In Malaysia the Chinese have their own schools and the kids learn Chinese as well as Malay and English, most of them graduated from there should be fluent in mandarin. Some even went on to attend universities in Taiwan.
The Chinese in Singapore were forced to be westernized by Lee's policy, his government forced the closure of many Chinese schools, including the best Chinese studies department in SE Asia at Nanyang University many decades ago. Ironically Singapore also became the most successful example of how Western political reforms merged with traditional Chinese legalism. The older generation Singapore Chinese can speak their dialect and English, but often not Mandarin. The younger kids were taught Mandarin in "mother tongue" classes and have some degree of fluency.
After the Vietnam war and Sino-Vietnam war, many ethnic Chinese left Vietnam in waves of Vi?t Ki?u exodus. These are also of Southern Chinese stock and most are fluent in one or more Chinese dialects plus Vietnamese. The older generation tend to be very traditional, but their children rarely learn Mandarin and often identify themselves more with Vietnamese, or are quickly assimilated into US culture. I suspect they also have higher ratio of intermarriage with non-Chinese. They don't identify well with ethnic Chinese from Taiwan, but are happy to eat at the same restaurants. Many shops in Los Angeles Chinatown are run by this ethnic sub-group.
The ethnic Chinese from Taiwan have 3 sub-groups, those with ancestors from Fujian ("Taiwanese"), those from Hakka ethnic sub-group, and mainland Chinese that immigrated to Taiwan during the Chinese civil war. They have their own dialects but everyone learns Mandarin and traditional Chinese writing in school. After the Malaysian Chinese, I'd probably rank the Taiwanese as #2 in their capacity of retain traditional Chinese (or localized variants) culture and practices. Immigrants from this group dominates the Chinese-ethnic business scene across Southern California, with exception to Chinatown and Westminster area. This is why most Chinese newspapers, store signs, menus, etc. here are published in traditional Chinese (used by Taiwan and HK) and not the simplified script used in Mainland China and Singapore.
After Taiwan-immigrants, the #2 position for commercial dominance in ethnic-Chinese business here is probably those from Hong Kong. This group are fluent in Cantonese and learn traditional Chinese and English in HK schools. During British colonial era, those who can speak English with British accents are preferred by employers such as major UK banks in HK. Many Chinese from HK can actually speak Mandarin, but with heavy accent. Some of them are quite Euro-centric and think anything European is better than American.
The ethnic Chinese immigrated directly from China were still quite rare in 1980s, but slowly grew in numbers through 1990's. They learn Mandarin and simplified Chinese in school (in China), but since most Chinese schools here are dominated by Taiwan-immigrants, if they send their kids there, they'd learn traditional Chinese instead. The older generation endured decades of Maoism and tend to be quite cynical when it comes to government and politics. The younger male kids, like many from other cultures/countries, exhibit symptoms of "nationalism without a clue" and will eventually grow out of it as they age. This group didn't retain traditional Chinese culture well due to communist cultural oppression, those that excelled and made to the top were shrewed survivors like Deng, and in the post-Deng economic reform era, where the iron rice-bowl was broken, you survive by being very competitive. An example is taking a taxi in Shenzhen, where people line up, but when the taxi pulls up, everyone makes a grab for the door, and the first person who grabs the door handle gets the taxi.
Due to the declining birth rate in Taiwan and Hong Kong, the future ethnic-Chinese immigrants will shift toward those from mainland China. Despite speaking the same language, there are many differences between ethnic Chinese from Taiwan vs. China due to political, cultural, and environmental differences. Taiwan is on its way toward become a civilized society like Singapore, while China was set back to year 0 because of Mao and had to restart from scratch. To cite one example, people who ride the MRT in Taipei behave as well as the ones in Singapore, versus China, where some stupid low-class riders on high-speed bullet train would rip-off items from the bathroom to take home as souvenirs. So if the knob on the water facet is missing you know why. Communism destroyed the traditional Confucian gentlemen scholar ideal and it'd take many years, if not decades, for them to recover their civilization. Both communism and democracy are western imports to Asia that destroyed the traditional governing structure and caused a power struggle that killed millions. Some countries adjusted well to modernity, others did not.
So what does this mean to us? If you're doing business planning and looking at the ethnic-Chinese immigrant population, you should be aware that immigrants from China is growing versus those from Taiwan is on the decline. These 2 groups may have different tastes and preferences, so a business that works well catering to Taiwanese may not do well catering to Mainland Chinese, and vice versa.
P.S. I didn't spend much time on 2nd-3rd generation Asians here, mostly on 1st and "1.5" generation. This is because if the kids/grand kids assimilated into the mainstream, then their tastes and preferences would be similar to the mainstream and not in the "ethnic Chinese' category. Also, other sub-groups like Thai-Chinese and Tsinoys are very assimilated into Thai/Philippine culture and probably don't apply here.
If any of you don't agree with anything that I've said, and have an urge to flame or troll the thread, feel free to flame me directly at: momopi@mail.com.
