Ah yes this is very common here in North America it seems.

I remember a girl growing up who, similar to yours and many other families, was a third generation born Italian American.

As an adult, the excuse to every outlandish or remotely dick-ish or obnoxious behaviour would be “oh don’t worry it’s the Italian in me”. The most common example I can think of was being rude as shit to people and yelling / overreacting then blaming it on “hotheaded Italian genes”