KUALA LUMPUR, Nov. 10 -- When Violet Lee Zi Yi began researching Malaysian Chinese youths, she admitted she initially approached the community with assumptions about its relative economic advantages, resources and access to opportunities.

What she discovered through interviews with these youths across Peninsular Malaysia was a much more complicated picture.

"I initially thought Chinese is a unitary block. It is so different," Lee said in an interview about the findings of IMAN Research's report, Kami Orang Sini Juga: Chinese Youths and Democratic Belonging - The Politics of Pragmatism and Fairness.

The report, prepared by Lee and co-researcher Liew Liang Hong, is based on interviews with 116 Malaysian Chinese youths aged between 18 and...