Sociologist Mia Tuan described the pattern in her 1998 book Forever Foreigners or Honorary Whites?, based on interviews with Asian Americans whose families had been in the US for generations. Many reported being complimented on their English or asked where they were from. A 2005 study by psychologists Sapna Cheryan and Benoît Monin found that Asian Americans often had their American identity questioned and responded by working harder to prove it.
The stereotype has had legal consequences. During World War II, about 120,000 people of Japanese descent, most of them US citizens, were incarcerated as potential enemies. In 1999, Los Alamos scientist Wen Ho Lee, a US citizen born in Taiwan, was held in solitary confinement for months on espionage-related charges. Most charges were dropped and the judge apologized to him.
The pattern appears in media as well. In 1998, MSNBC ran the headline "American beats out Kwan" after Tara Lipinski defeated Michelle Kwan at the Olympics, though both were American. Latino and Muslim Americans face similar assumptions. The stereotype treats loyalty and belonging as tied to race rather than citizenship.