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Young, Asian, full of potential … and feeling like an ‘impostor’. Why these adults struggle to celebrate their success

  • ‘Impostor syndrome’ is a psychological pattern of chronic self-doubt prevalent among high achievers, racial minorities, children of tiger parents and others
  • Six young Asian adults talk about what caused them to be sufferers and how it has affected their lives

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Impostor syndrome can see a person always discounting their achievements and focusing more on their mistakes and failures. Under-represented racial, ethnic and religious minorities are one of the groups in which it is prevalent. Photo: Getty Images/iStockphoto
Jason Hung

Raj Raghunathan argues in his book If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Happy that being rich, well-educated and accomplished is not a path to happiness. Rather, they are the gateway to a life of dissatisfaction.

Promising individuals have a tendency to belittle their own successes by comparing their performance to others who have achieved what they regard as even greater things, believes Raghunathan, a professor in the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas at Austin in the US.

Such people may suffer from impostor syndrome, or “impostorism”, a psychological pattern of chronic self-doubt, leading a person to continually question their abilities and fear they may be seen as a fraud.

Studies have shown that impostor syndrome is more prevalent among high achievers, women, and under-represented racial, ethnic and religious minorities. Tiger parenting – a largely Asian tendency for parents to pressure offspring to excel academically – may not help.

Karen Ng, 29, a doctor of pharmacy, has lived in Ontario, Canada, since the age of two. A product of tiger parenting, Ng says she always discounted her academic achievements and focused more on her mistakes and failures.

Even after Ng earned her doctoral degree at the top-tier University of Toronto, her parents were displeased with her decision to choose a programme in pharmacy rather than medicine.

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