[wbillingsley]

That's not an exclusively cross-cultural issue. The tension between duty and emotion is fairly common in western literature.

For example, the entire premise of Lady Windermere's Fan (an Oscar Wilde play) is Lady Windermere interpreting her husband's slightly stiff and dutiful manner as disinterest. To the point where she starts suspecting him of an affair where he turns out to be looking after her mother.

Or more recently, most of the Richard Curtis movies play off similar "comedy of manners" themes as various characters find it hard to express what they feel for one reason or another.