Despite the absence of official dietary guidelines for fibromyalgia, many patients adopt restrictive diets in an attempt to alleviate symptoms. Understanding their motivations and experiences is essential to inform patient-centred care. This qualitative study included 19 individuals with fibromyalgia who reported following restrictive diets. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and analyzed using phenomenological thematic analysis. An overarching theme, "Fibromyalgia in the Fabric of Self", captured how the condition shaped participants' identities, motivations, and eating behaviours. Three main themes emerged. (1) Ambiguous relationship to diets: fluctuating symptoms such as pain, fatigue, and digestive issues made the link between food and symptoms unclear. Food was perceived both as a potential trigger and as a remedy, generating tensions between pleasure, self-control, and fear of adverse effects. (2) Diet as a field of experimentation: in the absence of clear medical guidance, participants conducted self-directed dietary experiments, often with uncertain or placebo-like outcomes. These approaches frequently extended beyond conventional medicine. (3) Available and lacking resources: gaps in medical support fostered mistrust, while peer communities provided crucial informational and emotional support, though sometimes with contradictory advice. Participants expressed a strong need for personalised nutritional guidance from professionals who validate their lived experiences. Restrictive diets in fibromyalgia reflect complex processes of self-management and identity construction, often arising as responses to gaps in care. These findings emphasise the need for clinicians to consider restrictive diets with a tailored, evidence-based dietary support that acknowledges patients' subjective experiences while reducing uncertainty and conflicting information.

Macau’s intangible cultural heritage (ICH) exemplifies a unique Sino-Western cultural fusion, wherein the interplay of Eastern and Western traditions complicates conventional analysis of heritage complexity and resilience. To address this challenge, we introduce FusionNet, a multimodal AI framework integrating image-based classification, an attention mechanism, identity embedding, and knowledge graph modeling for context-aware analysis of ICH. FusionNet combines image-based deep learning with an attention mechanism to focus on salient visual features in heritage imagery. This integrated architecture enables a holistic understanding of heritage elements and their adaptability to changing cultural contexts. Applied to Macau’s ICH, FusionNet reveals patterns of cultural resilience, illustrating how traditional practices persist and evolve amid centuries of EastWest influences. Our findings demonstrate the efficacy of fusing visual and knowledge-based modalities for heritage analysis, offering a robust approach for studying and preserving intangible cultural heritage in complex cultural environments. To elucidate how Macau’s intangible cultural heritage (ICH) exhibits “cultural resilience” and the mechanisms of identity (re)construction amid Sino‑Portuguese cultural interweaving; and to propose a computable multimodal framework (FusionNet + cultural‑identity embeddings + knowledge graph) that quantifies and validates these mechanisms. Materials include digital archives and historical texts (e.g., Macau Memory), social‑media text (Weibo plus ~1,000 English TripAdvisor/blog reviews), open heritage images, and structured knowledge bases (China ICH database). Methods comprise an attention‑based image classifier (FusionNet), LDA topic modeling (5‑fold cross‑validation selecting k = 3; mean coherence ≈ 0.59, compared with BERTopic), bilingual sentiment analysis, knowledge‑graph embedding and link prediction (evaluated with MRR, Hits@10), and t‑SNE visualization with clustering (three clusters; average silhouette ≈ 0.47). All implementations are in Python. LDA reveals three stable themes: (A) Chinese traditions (~45%), (B) Lusophone heritage (~30%), and (C) hybrid/local identity (~25%; e.g., Patuá and Macanese cuisine). Sentiment analysis indicates >70% positive evaluations, with ~12–15% negative. On the image side, most categories achieve diagonal accuracy >0.80, with some true‑positive rates reaching 0.95–1.00; Sino‑Portuguese architecture shows interpretable confusion. Knowledge‑graph embeddings and t‑SNE place the “hybrid/local identity” between the Chinese and Portuguese clusters, acting as a bridge (silhouette ≈ 0.47). Overall, multimodal fusion is more robust than multiple baselines on recognition and semantic association tasks, revealing a resilience pathway in which Macau ICH preserves core practices while continually absorbing exogenous elements. The proposed multimodal, knowledge‑driven framework effectively quantifies and explains identity (re)construction and cultural resilience in Macau’s ICH within a Sino‑Portuguese milieu; the “hybrid/local identity” is the key bridging mechanism. Future work can expand cross‑platform data, enhance cross‑modal alignment and knowledge reasoning, and generalize the approach to other multicultural contexts to strengthen external validity.

ABSTRACT Using authentic menu data, this study examines coffee menu naming in Singapore’s kopitiams and independent cafés as a site of multilingual meaning-making and identity construction. Grounded in a socio-onomastic framework and supported by a descriptive analysis of naming patterns, the study compares their structural types, linguistic sources and the distribution of their functions. Kopitiam coffee naming is defined by fixed patterns and multilingual blending, reflecting routinised community consensus, whereas independent cafés adopt open, English-dominant combinations that index creativity, branding and global intelligibility. Despite their differences, both systems share mechanisms of pattern-based organisation and shared lexical repertoires that negotiate meaning between locality and globalisation. Viewed within Singapore’s two waves of globalisation, coffee naming in kopitiams extends the multilingual legacy of the colonial era, while the independent café system reflects consumer culture and linguistic commodification. Overall, coffee naming emerges as a social-semiotic practice through which language functions both as a communicative resource and as a marker of cultural identity, capturing Singapore’s ongoing balance between the local and the global.

Background: Social media has become an integral part of daily life, influencing how adults communicate, seek information, and construct identities. However, there is growing concern about its psychological effects, especially regarding anxiety, depression, self-esteem, and sleep patterns. While substantial research has focused on adolescents, the impact of social media on adults' mental health remains under-explored. Objective: This study aims to address this gap by examining the psychological effects of social media use among adults, with particular attention to how different usage patterns—active engagement versus passive consumption—affect mental well-being. Methodology: A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 188 adult participants. Data were collected through an online questionnaire that assessed demographics, social media usage patterns, and psychological well-being (including anxiety, depression, self-esteem, and sleep disruption). Regression analysis was performed to determine the relationship between social media usage and mental health outcomes, controlling for demographic variables. Findings: The study found that while the amount of time spent on social media did not significantly affect anxiety, depression, self-esteem, or sleep disruption, social comparison was significantly associated with higher anxiety and depressive symptoms. FoMO also showed a trend toward increased anxiety, though not statistically significant. Additionally, passive social media consumption was linked to lower self-esteem, and both age and employment status were positively correlated with self-esteem. There were no significant relationships between social media use and sleep disruption. Conclusion: The study underscores the importance of understanding engagement patterns and internal psychological processes in the context of social media use. Future interventions should consider digital behavior patterns, promoting balanced engagement and mitigating the negative effects of comparison and FoMO. Further longitudinal studies are needed to establish causal relationships and explore long-term effects.

ABSTRACT Writing is an important site of identity construction and enactment, especially for adolescent writers. In this study, we explore several interactions across writing sessions in a youth after‐school spoken word poetry team. The participants were engaged in writing a collaboratively‐authored “group poem” in which they took up and wrote in one another's voices and perspectives toward a piece of writing that ultimately emerged from the assemblage rather than any one poet. This paper examines the poets' identity‐making and perspective‐taking through exchanges related to one part of their poem over the course of three different days. We ask: How did youth poets engage with their own and others' identities and perspectives through the collaborative writing of a group poem? We find that participants' writing reflects a flexible understanding of identity as they highlight different aspects of their own identities and move in and out of each other's to take up different perspectives. However, we also find that participants' perspective‐taking allowed them both to express themselves and to understand each other. Throughout, we argue that all writing—not just writing with multiple authors—is collaborative and the product of an assemblage, rather than any individual, and call for attention to the sociomaterial landscape in which writers compose, including accounting for materials, bodies, and affect.

Purpose In contexts where heteronormativity remains deeply embedded in educational environments, LGBTQ students often encounter significant challenges in expressing their identities and exercising agency. This qualitative study aims to explore how three Thai LGBTQ university students navigate their identities within intercultural communication settings shaped by cultural expectations, power asymmetries and normative discourses. Design/methodology/approach Grounded in Positioning Theory and a poststructuralist view of agency, the research draws on snake interviews and semi-structured interviews to capture participants’ evolving narratives. Findings Findings reveal how participants engage in both self-positioning and interactive positioning to assert their identities and negotiate belonging in school, university, online intercultural exchanges and international student camps. Students’ agency is expressed through subtle resistance to binary gender norms, strategic self-disclosure and inspiration drawn from LGBTQ role models. While constraints persist, especially in culturally conservative encounters, university spaces and peer support emerged as enabling contexts for identity affirmation and agentive action. Originality/value This study contributes to a deeper understanding of how discourse, identity and agency intersect in intercultural experiences, and calls for more inclusive practices that empower LGBTQ students to participate fully and authentically in global learning environments.

Migration studies play a fundamental role in understanding the transformations of contemporary societies and the identity configurations that emerge in integration processes. Migration not only implies a change in place of residence but also in relationships and the construction of personal and collective identity. Cultural and artistic aspects are addressed to raise discussions about the dilemmas and conflicts surrounding migratory processes. This work investigates identity reconstruction in the context of migration through phenomena of integration and territorialization observed in artistic and cultural practices during the celebrations of the Virgin of Copacabana and Urkupiña by the Bolivian community in the city of Puerto Madryn, in the province of Chubut, Argentina. Using a mixed methodological strategy, the article proposes the recording and analysis of different sources: census data, publications in local media, and photographic records. The festivities of the Virgin of Copacabana and Urkupiña in Puerto Madryn serve as key spaces where the Bolivian community reconstructs its identity and socially integrates through artistic practices that combine tradition and adaptation, promoting a plural, intergenerational, and constantly evolving culture.

This article analyzes two historical episodes in which seafaring leaders were interpreted as divinities by island cultures: the voyage of the Inca Túpac Yupanqui to Oceania in the 15th century and the arrival of Captain James Cook to Hawaii in the 18th century, where he was identified as the god Lono. Drawing on historical, ethnographic, and colonial chronicle sources, the article examines the technological, symbolic, and cultural elements that fostered such confusion. It is proposed that these encounters constituted not only material exchanges but also profound mythological resignifications, in which premodern navigation played a central role in the construction of identities and sacred narratives. This comparative analysis invites us to reconsider Eurocentric narratives about American isolation and to recognize the interoceanic circulation of knowledge and technologies in pre-Columbian and colonial contexts.

This research aims to study the process of constructing community identity among the silk weaving group in Ban Phon, Kham Muang District, Kalasin Province, within the context of the state and contemporary society. It also seeks to analyze the social, cultural, and governmental factors influencing the preservation and transformation of such identity. This study employed a qualitative research methodology, using in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and participant observation. The key informants totaled 25 persons, consisting of 5 community leaders, 8 local silk weavers, 4 entrepreneurs, 4 government officers, 2 academic experts, and 2 cultural tourists.The findings revealed that the identity of the Ban Phon silk weaving community has been constructed and reshaped through various social processes and state policies, particularly those promoting the One Tambon One Product (OTOP) project, creative economy initiatives, and digital media for cultural communication. The image of "Phrae Wa Silk of Ban Phon" has become a cultural symbol reflecting both local pride and modern Thai identity. However, the changes brought by the digital era have led to the reinterpretation of identity in multiple dimensions—cultural, economic, and social. Therefore, identity construction is not merely a process of preservation but also a dynamic adaptation of the community to contemporary social transformations.

Virtual exchange programmes such as collaborative online international learning (COIL) are increasingly promoted in higher education as equitable and interculturally oriented initiatives aimed at countering democratic decline and rising polarisation. Yet much practitioner literature still relies on essentialist notions of culture and identity, whereas recent research highlights them as fluid and interactionally accomplished. From this perspective, intercultural communication competence involves examining viewpoints, questioning ideologies, and navigating multiple identities. We investigate how students negotiate identity in COIL and consider the implications for theorising and teaching intercultural competence. Our analysis draws on interaction from a 2019 COIL project between intercultural communication students in Finland and the Netherlands. Using membership categorisation analysis, we examine three online meetings of a five‑member group whose task involved discussing food. We analyse three cases of action‑oriented category work where participants construct identities through both simple and complex orientations to food and locality: (1) simultaneous construction of different and shared student identities to explain an incomplete task; (2) enactment of local identity to justify choices in the assignment; and (3) culinary othering to craft a non-local student identity. We argue that we need pedagogical approaches that move beyond stereotype reduction and instead engage learners with the tensions and consequences of identity negotiation—and that the concept of simplexity can provide a foundation for such an approach.

Abstract This study investigates how immigrant teachers and local Taiwanese students collaboratively construct cultural categories to create learning opportunities in a Southeast Asian cooking class. The data consist of 12.5 h of video recordings from an adult learning center. Drawing on sequential categorization analysis, the study examines how participants invoke formulation-, turn-, and sequence-generated cultural categories to organize epistemic authority and establish what counts as learnable knowledge. Three interactional practices are identified through which participants mobilize cultural categories to teach and learn about Southeast Asian cuisines: (a) generalizing features of Southeast Asian culinary practices, (b) constructing analogies bridging Taiwanese and Southeast Asian cuisines, and (c) contrasting observed Southeast Asian cooking with Taiwanese practices. These practices are accomplished through multimodal coordination, particularly gaze shifts that expand or change participation frameworks to index cultural distinction or affiliation. The findings extend research on identity construction in instruction beyond language learning contexts, revealing how cultural categories function as mutually constructed epistemic frameworks that simultaneously organize epistemic authority and create learning opportunities – making visible the category-bound predicates through which participants facilitate the learning of culture-specific culinary practices in situ.

ABSTRACT This article examines the artistic practices of Chinese factory workers in the twentieth century, focusing on predominantly visual artworks that represented labor conditions, fostered class consciousness, and constructed worker identities. It argues that factory art functioned not only as a tool for political propaganda and class education but also as a space for workers to express subjectivity and negotiate identity. Drawing on primary sources, including factory archives, propaganda posters, murals, and workers’ photography, the study employs historical and visual culture analysis to trace the evolution of factory art from the 1950s to the 1990s. The findings show that through participatory artistic creation, workers shifted from ‘passive producers’ to ‘active cultural constructors,’ forming labor identities that encompassed both collective and individual dimensions. This process highlights art’s value as a ‘living archive’ of labor history. The article demonstrates that the transformation of factory art reflects changing political and economic contexts while revealing the logic of workers’ subjective practices, offering a cross-disciplinary framework for labor culture studies and deepening understanding of the social and cultural roles of the Chinese working class.

ABSTRACT Language acquisition is not just about linguistic proficiency, but also about negotiating one’s identity within the linguistic community. In this context, technology seems to influence how language learners construct their identities. To deepen this idea, a systematic literature review is developed, analysing 31 studies published between 2020 and 2024. Findings show the dynamic interplay between language learning, identity construction, and digital tools, particularly in the context of plurilingualism, and how technology impacts language learners’ identity. Analysed studies also reveal how language learners often use digital platforms to experiment with hybrid identities, blending their native/home languages, target languages, and cultural affiliations. Moreover, they also show that technology allows learners to draw on their entire linguistic repertoire. Ultimately, this review aims to contribute to a deeper understanding of the relationship between language, identity, and technology, offering implications for designing inclusive language learning environments that can be used in today’s complex world.

The rapid expansion of the culinary tourism industry has generated intense competition and increasing product homogeneity, compelling food and beverage (F&B) businesses to formulate effective menu differentiation strategies in order to create distinctive value propositions. This study aims to describe the forms of menu differentiation strategies and analyze their role in enhancing tourist attraction in Bandung and Malang. Employing a descriptive qualitative approach with a phenomenological method, this research explores the essence of tourists’ lived experiences through participatory observation, in-depth interviews, and triangulation using digital perception analysis derived from Google Reviews and social media platforms. The findings indicate that effective menu differentiation integrates three interrelated dimensions: physical aspects (uniqueness of taste and ingredients), interactional aspects (service quality and hospitality), and emotional aspects (historical and cultural narratives embedded in the menu). Google Reviews function as an objective performance mirror that validates service consistency, while social media operates as a platform for social identity construction and visual storytelling, particularly among Generation Z consumers. The study concludes that the success of differentiation strategies depends significantly on the ability of businesses to transform menu uniqueness into shareable digital content, thereby creating memorable gastronomic experiences and strengthening tourist loyalty.

ABSTRACT Mobile phone purchases increasingly function as identity performances, with consumers attaching meanings of success, modernity, sustainability, and belonging to their devices. These meanings emerge within convergent media ecosystems and omnichannel environments where smartphones act as both product and medium shaping discovery, evaluation, and purchase. In a volatile global market, understanding how identity cues guide channel navigation is strategically critical. This paper introduces the Mediated Omnichannel Identity Flow (MOIF), a framework explaining how cross-channel exposures activate identity constructs, shape evaluation criteria and channel preferences, and translate identity-informed preferences into purchase decisions. Integrating insights from identity signaling, cultural consumption, personalization, influencer mediation, and omnichannel journey theory, MOIF demonstrates how symbolic fit, channel agility, and identity evolution shape consumer pathways. Consumers may discover via YouTube, validate in-store, and purchase online while expecting symbolic coherence. MOIF links cultural media dynamics to identity work and offers strategies for designing identity-aware omnichannel retail systems.

ABSTRACT This article explores how diasporic Afghans in Canada form their identities and construct identity in relation to their homeland, Afghanistan. Methodologically, I adopt a desire-based approach that centers Afghan self-representation and self-determination, moving beyond damage-centered narratives that focus primarily on trauma. Drawing on 40 semi-structured interviews with Afghan Canadians, I illustrate how diasporic Afghans navigate and (re)construct their Afghan identity, as well as the tools they use to develop understandings of the homeland. I argue that diasporic Afghans continuously (re)negotiate their diasporic identities to create multiple definitions of “home”, influenced by their interlocking religious, ethnic, and hybrid cultural identities. The findings highlight the heterogeneity and internal complexity of identity formation processes among diasporic Afghans, challenging homogeneous and monolithic categorizations of “Afghan”. Conceptually, this article suggests that notions of the watan (homeland) are a transnational and fluid phenomenon, constructed through the geopolitical lens of Afghanistan and the Canadian host society.

Introduction: Learning communities have established themselves as collaborative spaces that promote teacher reflection, but their implementation in initial physical education training has been little studied. Objective: To understand how physical education university students experience and make sense of their participation in learning communities during their university career. Methodology: Qualitative study with an interpretive phenomenological design. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 30 students from intentionally selected universities in Chile. The data were analyzed using open and axial coding with the support of ATLAS. ti. 7.5 software. Results: The analysis identified five categories: initial expectations, professional development, cross-cutting skills, teaching prospects, and sense of belonging. Learning communities fostered critical reflection, theory-practice integration, collaboration with peers and teachers, and the construction of a teaching identity committed to reality. Conclusion: Participation in learning communities was a configured as a meaningful formative process that fostered professional competencies and collaborative relationships, although certain difficulties remain that limit its scope, thereby highlighting the need for university environments that promote reflective and collective practices.

ABSTRACT This article examines how two Euroregions – the tri-national Nisa (CZ–PL–DE) and the bi-national Glacensis (CZ–PL) – govern cross-border tourism under the same EU funding framework yet through contrasting institutional logics. Drawing on over 400 INTERREG-funded projects from 2014–2020, complemented by interviews, strategic documents, and spatial analysis, we develop a typology distinguishing an infrastructural–procedural model (Glacensis) and an interpretive–participatory model (Nisa). The findings show how cross-border governance reflects not just policy design but also deeply embedded administrative cultures, actor constellations, and spatial imaginaries. Tourism emerges as both a policy field and a symbolic medium for regional identity construction. By situating these empirical insights within theories of euroregionalism, multi-level governance, and tourism governance, the article contributes to a more nuanced understanding of how European integration unfolds through localized cooperation practices. We argue that Euroregions function as laboratories of border governance, where symbolic depth, actor diversity, and spatial connectivity shape the evolving meanings of “Europe” at the subnational scale.

This review article explores the applicability of the Social Identity Approach (SIA) in historical research, focusing on research and sources from the Early Modern era, particularly the context of the Lutheran Reformation. The study argues that while identity is often treated as self-evident in religious historical research, SIA offers conceptual tools that can enrich historical interpretation. Using examples from sixteenth- and seventeenth-century writers’ texts, the article demonstrates how boundaries of “true Christianity” were negotiated and maintained, and how the conceptualizations of SIA could be used in these discussions. It also highlights methodological challenges: historians lack direct access to human cognitive processes and must rely on mediated, fragmentary sources, which necessitates contextualization and source criticism to avoid anachronism. SIA should therefore be employed as a heuristic framework rather than a predictive model. When applied critically, it enables nuanced analysis of identity construction and group dynamics, fostering interdisciplinary dialogue between history and social psychology.

This study applies a qualitative, descriptive, and interpretative approach, using the semiotic method proposed by Umberto Eco [1] and Roland Barthes [2] to unravel the ideological discourses in colonial visual production. Through a decolonial perspective, based on Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui [3], and Walter Mignolo [4]. The research questions colonial power structures inscribed in virreinal pictorial works and their influence on contemporary Bolivian identity construction. The analysis reveals that colonial graphic signs functioned not only as instruments of cultural domination, but also as spaces for resignification and resistance. Furthermore, the study posits the reappropriating of these signs for current graphic design an exercise in cultural reclamation and identity construction. The research contributes to the debate on the decolonization of art and proposes a critical reading that links history, aesthetics, and visual communication in the Bolivian context.