Asian people and dogs

We have a large Asian population locally, but none of them appear to be dog owners. Indeed, from their behaviour, many of them seem to be afraid of dogs. I wondered if anone else had noticed this, and if anyone knew if there was a cultural reason for this ? Folks I'm talking about are mostly born and bred locally.

Just today, we were walking our dogs past a party of primary school kids, out on a field trip. Our little dog, Tim, is generally regarded as 'cute' by most girls, from toddlers to teenagers, and it is often quite embarassing the attention he receives. Except for the Asian lass, jumping around and squealing that she was scared of dogs.

I've seen this before, an Asian dad warning his kids away from our dogs, when I was waiting for my wife outside M&S. Sensible to be cautious, obviously, but I did think he was over reacting.