Identity-related Factors Research Articles

Adaptive transition decisions and identity exploration among transgender and nonbinary persons exposed to gender identity conversion efforts

Introduction Transgender and nonbinary (TNB) persons’ healthcare experiences and related transition decisions have received increasing attention in recent years. Growing literature indicates gender non-affirming practices, such as gender identity conversion efforts (GICE), are harmful for the wellbeing of TNB persons. Yet, how exposure to GICE is linked to transition related decisions among TNB persons remains unexplored. This study examines links between GICE and TNB persons’ transition decisions and identity exploration, using a conceptual framework that distinguishes adaptive transition decisions (e.g. transition interruptions due to interpersonal coercion) from identity-related transition decisions. Methods This study is a secondary data analysis of the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey (N = 27,630). Multinomial logistic regression was conducted to examine the relationship between GICE and transition decisions among TNB persons while controlling for demographic covariates. Results Overall, 13.5% of TNB participants experienced GICE. Participants interrupted their transition due to interpersonal coercion (4.9%), structural factors (2.0%), and identity-related factors (0.4%). Participants with GICE exposure were more likely to report interrupting their transition due to interpersonal coercion than not interrupting their transition. However, GICE-exposed participants did not have a higher chance of identity-related transition interruptions than no interruptions. Conclusions These findings point to a potentially harmful role GICE may play in the transition decisions of TNB persons. Our analysis adds to evidence indicating the need for banning GICE and calls for a more nuanced understanding, recognition, and respect for TNB persons’ non-linear transitioning trajectories. Otherwise, we risk vilifying gender-affirming practices and pathologizing adaptive transitioning decisions of TNB persons.

Geographical Dimensions of Populist Euroscepticism

The appeal of populism has been explained by individual preferences expressed along two dimensions: a left-right economic dimension and a cosmopolitan-traditionalist cultural dimension. However, this distinction has been contested by recent studies pointing out that economic and cultural factors reinforce each other in linking structural transformations, like globalisation and technological change, to populist political outcomes. Given the spatially uneven character of the effects of structural transformations, our contribution argues that ‘place’ should be a central category in the analysis of Eurosceptic populism. By focusing on place, it becomes easier to understand how material and identity-related factors interact in triggering a demand for populism, and how this interaction sets the ground for the reception of populist narratives in different locations. We set out a research agenda for improving our understanding of the political implications of local socio-economic trajectories in Western European left-behind areas, places in Central and Eastern Europe struggling since transition into democracy begun, Southern European locations hit by the Eurozone crisis, and beyond.

Identity influences on medical students' orientation to feedback during third year clinical rotations.

Medical students' feedback orientation (their attitudes about and preferences for feedback from preceptors) may change over the course of the third year of medical school and is likely influenced by identity-related factors. This study proposed that both how students view themselves personally (i.e., impostor syndrome) and how they view themselves in relation to the group (i.e., identification with the profession) are identity factors related to related to feedback orientation during clinical rotations. 177 third-year medical students enrolled in a four-phase longitudinal survey study beginning at the start of clinical rotations and continuing every twelve weeks of the academic year thereafter. Feedback orientation was conceptualized and measured as comprising aspects of utility (i.e., feedback is valuable and useful), sensitivity (i.e., feeling intimidated or threatened by corrective feedback), confidentiality (i.e., public/private context of feedback), and retention (i.e., feedback remembered). Results indicated that these aspects of feedback orientation did not significantly change during the third year. Instead, impostor syndrome was at least marginally, significantly associated with all aspects of feedback orientation across phases. Group identity was associated with feedback utility and retention, and female-identifying students reported significantly greater feedback confidentiality and feedback retention. Interventions may be needed to improve medical students' attitudes about feedback, particularly for those who experience impostor syndrome. Fostering group cohesion among medical students may influence how well students remember feedback and find it useful.

Re-expatriation inclinations among skilled female self-initiated repatriates in Asia's rapidly emerging markets

PurposeIntegrating identity theory and role theory, this study examines the re-expatriation inclinations of highly-skilled professional female self-initiated repatriates (SIRs) in an Asian rapidly emerging market (REM) and the reasons underlying these inclinations.Design/methodology/approachThe authors conducted a survey on a sample of highly-skilled professional female SIRs in Vietnam (N = 248). Structural equation modelling was used to evaluate the model.FindingsThe study found that female SIRs' career identity, family identity and social identity have a significant influence on their inclinations to re-expatriate. Attitude towards re-expatriation fully mediates the influence of family identity and career identity on re-expatriation inclinations.Research limitations/implicationsThis research was limited to female SIRs in one REM, namely Vietnam, and may lack generalisability in countries and contexts.Originality/valueBy delineating the identity-related factors that contribute to skilled female SIRs' inclinations to re-expatriate and recognising gender as a complex, multifaceted social construct, the authors broaden the way expatriation is conceptualised and isolate factors that can inform practices for recruitment and retention of this important sub-set of international talent.

The Election of a Fringe Candidate: Anomalous or Normal? The Arrival of Donald Trump to the White House in 2016

Donald Trump’s 2016 successful electoral bid came as a surprise both to the public and pundits. Soon after the upset election, conventional wisdom settled on an explanation: that Trump’s victory was linked to Americans that felt left behind by globalization and the current political establishment. Conventional wisdom provided quick and straightforward answers. Nevertheless, these answers were incomplete. Chief among the missing elements of the improvised explanation was the radicalization of the Republican party. To fully understand how the transformation of the Republican Party resulted in President Trump’s election and his foreign policy, this article will analyze the case through constructivist lenses. According to this perspective, identity plays a crucial role in both domestic and international politics. By providing an analysis of American identity and especially of the identity of the Republican Party, constructivism provides useful knowledge in the interpretation of both Trump’s election and his administration’s foreign policy. We argue that what really explains Trump victory in the electoral college in the November 2016 electoral process (he lost the popular vote by about three million votes) are ideational, identity-related factors—not his personality or the globalization-related arguments conventional wisdom focuses on.

Bidirectional relationship between L2 pragmatic development and learner identity in a study abroad context

In recent years, the connection between learner identity and learning of L2 pragmatics has received more attention in applied linguistic research. Nevertheless, investigations on this topic have mainly focused on the role of learners' identity in their L2 pragmatic choices. The reverse influence has not been adequately investigated in empirical studies – how learning of L2 pragmatics could potentially foster learners' identity change. This article aims to expand our understanding of the link between identity and L2 pragmatic development in the study abroad context by describing a longitudinal case study which tracked the experiences of four Chinese postgraduate students sojourning in the UK. Data were generated through interviews and online chat over a 12-month period. Findings indicate a bidirectional influence between L2 pragmatics development and learners' sense of self: learners’ pragmatic judgements and preferences are influenced by identity-related factors, such as internalised cultural values and their perceived foreigner and ELF identities; in return, exposure to new L2 pragmatic features can prompt learner reflection on interpersonal relationships and self-positioning, which may then lead to identity development.

LGBTQ Identity-Related Victimization During COVID-19 Is Associated with Moderate to Severe Psychological Distress Among Young Adults.

Purpose: Existing evidence indicates significant threats against the mental health of sexual and gender minority (SGM) young adults as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, including elevated rates of substance use, anxiety, depression, and traumatic stress. Therefore, it is imperative to understand the mechanistic identity-related factors that may influence the mental health needs of SGM young adults in the time of COVID-19. This study aims to examine the impact of increases in lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning (LGBTQ) identity-related victimization since the start of COVID-19 on psychological distress among SGM college students. Methods: A nonprobability, cross-sectional online survey was conducted between May and August 2020 to explore the psychological impacts of COVID-19 on U.S. SGM college students (N = 565). Previously validated scales were used to measure LGBTQ identity-related victimization and psychological distress. Chi-square tests of independence, independent samples T-tests, and adjusted logistic regression were used to examine the study aim. Results: Adjusted logistic regression findings revealed that reporting past year+more frequent LGBTQ identity-related victimization since the start of COVID-19 (compared to no report) was associated with over four times greater odds of experiencing moderate to severe psychological distress. Conclusion: Findings highlight the importance of research, practice, and policy stakeholders toward addressing the unique identity-related mental health needs and victimization experiences of SGM college students. Mental health, social service, and higher education practitioners have an important opportunity and responsibility toward identifying and intervening on SGM college students and young adults facing identity-related victimization amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Shame, endorse, or remain silent?: State response to human rights violations in other countries

Naming and shaming has been widely used by governments and non-governmental organizations to address human rights violations. Yet despite the prevalence of this foreign policy instrument, the question of when states publicly denounce norm-violators received relatively little scholarly attention. We examine this question in the context of China’s repression of its Uyghur minority. This case offers a unique opportunity to study not only when countries engage in naming and shaming but also when they explicitly defend or endorse rights violations. We analyze the official positions of 174 countries between 2019 and 2021. We find that while geopolitical alignment is a significant predictor of both shaming and defending, a nation’s strong trade links with China has a less straightforward effect. Similarly, while democracies are significantly less likely to defend China’s Uyghur policy, they are not more likely to denounce it. We also find that identity-related factors have a muted effect. The paper advances our understanding of a broader spectrum of government behavior vis-a-vis human rights violations in other countries, and has implications for the role of identity in inter-state shaming.

Identity-Related Factors Protect Well-Being Against Stigma for Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming People

Relatively little is known about identity-related resilience factors associated with well-being among transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) people. Drawing upon theory on stigma-related stress and resilience and work examining group identification as a buffer against discrimination, the aim of the current study was to model perceived discrimination, transgender identification, and gender identity affirmation as predictors of well-being for TGNC people. We also tested whether the positive association between gender identity affirmation and well-being might be explained by the benefits affirmation has for individual self-concept clarity. Participants were 105 TGNC individuals (42% transgender male, 39% transgender female, 19% other gender non-conforming [e.g., non-binary]) recruited through online forums and support groups in the UK and North America who completed an online survey including self-report measures of key constructs. Results from structural equation models demonstrated that: (1) experiences of discrimination were associated with lower well-being overall, but having a stronger transgender identity moderated this association; (2) after adjustment for discrimination and transgender identification, experiences of gender identity affirmation were independently associated with greater well-being for TGNC people. Secondary analyses demonstrated that gender identity affirmation was linked to well-being through reinforcing a strong, internalized sense of clarity about individual self-concept. Results are discussed in terms of the implications for TGNC health and well-being, particularly with regard to the need for supportive, identity-affirming social environments.

Testing Inequality and Identity Accounts of Racial Gaps in Political Expression on Social Media

ABSTRACT Do social media simply reproduce political inequality between racial groups or are they powerful tools for marginalized racial groups to contest the status quo? This study examined resource-based and identity-based theoretical explanations for differences between White people and racial/ethnic minorities in political expression on social media. Across 4 nationally representative surveys collected in the United States (2016 & 2018), we found that White people (vs. Black, Asian, and sometimes Hispanic people) had a slightly higher probability of engaging in different forms of political expression on social media. However, Black people and people from some numerically smaller racial/ethnic groups were more likely than White people to engage in symbolic behaviors such as using hashtags and changing their profile picture. While there was some evidence that differences in socioeconomic status and political interest may explain White people’s higher likelihood of political expression, identity-related factors played a counter-stratifying role. Racial/ethnic minorities were more likely than White people to view their racial group as having too little influence in American politics, a perception which was in turn positively related to political expression on social media. We use our findings – and their limitations – to argue for more robust theorization and measurement in the study of race in political communication on social media.

Suicidal self-directed violence among gender minority individuals: A systematic review.

Gender minority individuals represent a population at increased risk for suicidal self-directed violence (SDV). However, traditional models of suicidal SDV fail to consider gender minority population-specific factors that may buffer or exacerbate risk; further, while sexual and gender minority (SGM) health disparity frameworks may be extended suicidal SDV outcomes among gender minority individuals, little research exists bridging the gap between suicidal SDV research and SGM health disparity research. Thus, the current study sought to identify factors from SGM health disparity models related to suicidal SDV among gender minority individuals. The current study presents a synthesis of peer-reviewed publications (n=11) that were informed by an SGM health framework and specifically examined suicidal SDV among adult gender minority individuals within the United States. Factors from SGM health disparity models related to suicidal SDV outcomes included the following: 1) gender minority identity-related factors; 2) gender minority-related rejection, discrimination, harassment, and victimization; 3) structural stigma; and 4) resilience factors. Findings support the applicability of SGM health disparity concepts to suicidal SDV outcomes among gender minority individuals. Future longitudinal research with more diverse participants examining the impact of intersectionality of identity and predictive model fit is warranted.

National identity profiles and support for the European Union

Scholars have long recognized that national identity-related factors are among the strongest predictors of citizens’ attitudes toward the European Union. But while some find that they reinforce support for the European Union, other scholars show that national identity undermines its support. In this article, we aim to disentangle this puzzle by studying how the national identity profiles of European citizens relate to support for the European Union across individuals and member states. To this end, we employ data from the International Social Survey Program 2013, by far the most extensive collection of survey questions on national identity, and the technique of latent class analysis. Our results show which specific configurations of national identity entail support, ambivalence or rejection of the European Union, their antecedents, and their variation across countries.

A cross-cultural study to explore the differential impacts of online social capital on psychosocial outcomes

The nature of the relationship between online social capital and well-being may be impacted by a number of important factors, such as identity motives and self-presentational strategies. Additionally, there are likely to be cross-cultural variations in this respect, given that social internet use can vary considerably cross-nationally. Participants (N ​= ​682) from the UK and Saudi Arabia completed questionnaires which took cross-sectional measures of online social capital (bonding and bridging), identity motives, self-presentational strategies and aspects of well-being. Findings revealed some cross-cultural variations in the extent to which online social capital operated on identity-related factors and well-being. Namely, online bridging was distinctly more prominent for Saudi users compared to UK users, in its relationships with all identity motives and some cascading effects on aspects of well-being. For UK users, online bonding appeared to hold significant relationships with the identity motives of efficacy and belonging, and these mediated the link onto loneliness and life satisfaction. Overall, this suggests that online social capital varies cross-culturally, specifically in respect of how different types of online social resources impact upon well-being via varying presentational efforts.

ФАКТОРИ ІДЕНТИЧНОСТІ У ФОРМУВАННІ ЗОВНІШНЬОПОЛІТИЧНОГО КУРСУ ДЕРЖАВ БАЛТІЇ У 1991–2014 РР.

Foreign policies of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in post-Soviet decades have been prominent for their continuity and consistency. Since identity is usually considered as one of the major factors of consistency and continuity of politics, the goal was set to examine the role of different identity factors in formation of foreign policies of the three Baltic states in the period from international recognition of their independence in August 1991 to the Ukrainian Crisis of spring 2014 in European politics. The analysis of literature and sources suggests some assumptions on how identity-related factors influenced foreign policies of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, They could be summarized in a hypothesis that making of the Baltic foreign policies was deeply influenced by “ethnocratic” nature of political regimes, establishedin Baltic states, ideological constructs based on their historical memories and memory politics as well as geopolitical identities of being “small states” and being influenced by the “Baltic unity” idea. Examining of these assumptions allows to conclude that effects of some identity factors, like ethnic identities, are often overestimated, while others really played very important, sometimes decisive, role in developments of major foreign policy vectors of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.The deterioration of their relations with Russia in the period under review was largelydetermined by ideological constructs of legal state continuity and Soviet occupation deeply rooted in the XX century historical memories of Baltic states. While Western vectors of their foreign policies and first of all their relations with the USA developed in line with the logic of securitization based on self-perception of Baltic political elites of being “small states”.

Disentangled Representation Learning for Multiple Attributes Preserving Face Deidentification.

Face is one of the most attractive sensitive information in visual shared data. It is an urgent task to design an effective face deidentification method to achieve a balance between facial privacy protection and data utilities when sharing data. Most of the previous methods for face deidentification rely on attribute supervision to preserve a certain kind of identity-independent utility but lose the other identity-independent data utilities. In this article, we mainly propose a novel disentangled representation learning architecture for multiple attributes preserving face deidentification called replacing and restoring variational autoencoders (R2VAEs). The R2VAEs disentangle the identity-related factors and the identity-independent factors so that the identity-related information can be obfuscated, while they do not change the identity-independent attribute information. Moreover, to improve the details of the facial region and make the deidentified face blends into the image scene seamlessly, the image inpainting network is employed to fill in the original facial region by using the deidentified face as a priori. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method effectively deidentifies face while maximizing the preservation of the identity-independent information, which ensures the semantic integrity and visual quality of shared images.

Re-Expatriation Inclinations of Professional Women Returnees in Asia's Rapidly Developing Economies

Highly-skilled expatriation increasingly involves women that are an important source of talent in relatively under-developed, emerging countries that desire to grow quickly by economic transformation. Many of these are returnees with high-quality education and/or work experience in more developed economies but some of them may consider re-expatriating. We combine Tharenou’s (2010) stages of the mobility cycle with Identity theory to understand the re-expatriation inclinations among 248 professional Vietnamese women. We find that career identity, family identity and social identity have a significant influence on returnees’ inclination to re-expatriate. We also find that attitude towards re-expatriation fully mediates the influence of family identity and career identity on re-expatriation inclinations. The research furthers our understanding by delineating the extent to which identity-related factors contribute to professional women returnees’ inclinations to re-expatriate. By also being in line with the Academy of Management’s 2020 conference theme of 2020 theme by break down dichotomies and broadening the way migration and expatriation is seen, we suggest government and organizational policies for retaining this important talent by better supporting them in their community and workplace.

Abstract B78: Role of noradrenergic core regulatory circuitry transcription factors in neuroblastoma cell identity

Abstract Introduction: The heterogeneity of neuroblastoma cell identity has been recently revealed with the characterization of noradrenergic and NCC (neural crest cell)-like/mesenchymal cells, each cell type being governed by a core regulatory circuitry (CRC) of specific transcription factors (Boeva et al., 2017; van Groningen et al., 2017). Whereas the noradrenergic CRC includes the PHOX2B, HAND2, and GATA3 transcription factors, the CRC associated to the NCC-like/mesenchymal identity is composed of AP-1 transcription factors among others. The present study aims at deciphering the role of the identity-related transcription factors, PHOX2B and GATA3, in the establishment and maintenance of the noradrenergic identity. Experimental Procedures: Using the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing approach, we performed the knockout of PHOX2B and GATA3 genes in the SH-SY5Y neuroblastoma cell line. The obtained clones were characterized in terms of growth, phenotype, and identity, using in particular transcriptomic (RNA-seq) and epigenomic (H3K27ac ChIP-seq) analysis. Results: PHOX2B knockout in the SH-SY5Y cell line did not change its identity. PHOX2B−/− cells keep their noradrenergic phenotype, demonstrating that PHOX2B expression is not essential for the maintenance of the noradrenergic CRC. Nevertheless, the absence of PHOX2B expression in these cells decreased their proliferation both in vitro and in vivo, after mouse xenografts. In contrast to PHOX2B knockout cells, GATA3 knockout cells exhibit a mesenchymal phenotype: GATA3−/− cells harbor actin stress fibers and display migration and invasion capacities. Compared to the parental cells, they exhibit a higher resistance to chemotherapy in vitro. In a hierarchical unsupervised clustering, GATA3−/− cells show a transcriptomic profile close to neuroblastoma mesenchymal cell lines, with a weak expression of the noradrenergic set of transcription factors, including PHOX2B, and a high expression of factors related to the mesenchymal identity. Consistently with their transcriptomic profile, GATA3−/− cells are characterized by a super-enhancer landscape close to that of the SH-EP mesenchymal cell line. Finally, GATA3 knockout cells exhibit a decreased proliferation both in vitro and in vivo in xenograft experiments. Further experiments are ongoing to explore cell identity in the obtained tumors. Conclusions: PHOX2B and GATA3, which are two members of the noradrenergic CRC, play different roles in the maintenance of the noradrenergic identity in neuroblastoma cells. We hypothesize that PHOX2A could compensate for the absence of PHOX2B, thus explaining why PHOX2B knockout cells maintain their noradrenergic identity. In contrast, GATA3 knockout cells exhibit a mesenchymal identity. Bioinformatics analyses are ongoing to decipher the reprogramming process of these cells. Citation Format: Agathe Peltier, Caroline Louis-Brennetot, Cécile Pierre-Eugène, Cécile Thirant, Simon Durand, Divya Sahu, Sandrine Grossetête-Lalami, Virginie Raynal, Sylvain Baulande, Olivier Delattre, Valentina Boeva, Isabelle Janoueix-Lerosey. Role of noradrenergic core regulatory circuitry transcription factors in neuroblastoma cell identity [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Special Conference on the Advances in Pediatric Cancer Research; 2019 Sep 17-20; Montreal, QC, Canada. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2020;80(14 Suppl):Abstract nr B78.

Identity-Related Factors Affecting the Mental Health of African Immigrant Youth Living in Canada

In countries like Canada with significant immigrant populations, immigrant youth can have various experiences that impact their identity and mental health outcomes. This paper presents findings from a study that examined the perceptions of mental health among African immigrant youth living in Canada and the factors that affect their mental health outcomes, including identity-related factors. An interpretive description design was used and eight participants were recruited. Data were gathered through in-person and phone interviews. The paper focuses on the migration factors that affect African immigrant youths’ mental health. Three subthemes emerged from participants’ experiences: (a) social support; (b) discrimination and othering; and (c) identity and cultural shock. Using critical theory and intersectionality, the study showed that African immigrant youths’ identity and mental health were influenced by deeper socio-political and historical factors.

Identity, trust and altruism: An experiment on preferences and microfinance lending

We conduct laboratory and online experiment treatments to study willingness to lend, potential crowd out of philanthropic motivation by financial returns, and preference over borrowers in micro-finance lending. We distinguish between perceptions of transaction-related factors, such as neediness and trustworthiness, and identity-related factors such as ethnicity and gender. By looking at both channels together we are able to assess the extent to which identity-related differences in lending can be attributed to differences in how transaction-related factors are perceived among people with similar and different identities. We find that (1) both financial return and philanthropic motivation affect the amount lent, with little evidence that the former crowds out the latter; (2) lenders prefer borrowers with whom they share gender and ethnic similarity even after controlling for perceived riskiness and neediness; and (3) lenders are willing to trade greater risk in order to help more needy borrowers, but at a rate sensitive to their own degree of financial exposure. Lack of crowding out, homophily effects in some subgroups, and robustness to decision order are found in additional treatments with three subject pools, including one of non-student participants.

Abstract 5287: Prostate-derived Etsfactor modulates AR-mediated gene expression and promotes luminal differentiation

Abstract Introduction: Transcription regulation, governed by the presence of transcription factors and the accessibility of regulatory elements such as enhancers is crucial in restricting lineage plasticity. Deregulated expression of differentiation-related transcription factors leads to cancer progression and poor prognosis. Prostate-derived ETS factor (PDEF) is one of the cell identity-related transcription factors characterized by the abundance of H3K27ac near its genomic locus. Highly expressed in prostate luminal cells, PDEF has been shown to promote the transcription of PSA in collaboration with AR. Our previous studies showed loss of PDEF is associated with higher Gleason score and tumor metastasis through MMP9 and Twist1. However, the role of PDEF, as a transcription factor, remains poorly understood. In this study, we evaluated the effects of PDEF on modulation of AR cistrome and luminal/epithelial differentiation. Methods: TCGA data were extracted from cBioportal and analyzed using R. Gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) was performed using default settings and gene sets were downloaded from MySigDB. Genomic coverage analysis was performed using SeqPlots. ChIP-seq analysis was performed using GALAXY. PC3 cells were grown in DMEM/F12 medium and retroviral expression was used to generate cells with stable PDEF expression. ChIP experiments were performed using Chromatrap ChIP-seq kit followed by standard qPCR with SYBR-Green. Gene track was visualized with IGV. Results: Despite the oncogenic role of AR signaling, it plays a pivotal part in prostate luminal differentiation. We observed that prostate cancer progression is associated with loss of PDEF accompanied by a transcription switch from canonical AR targets to non-canonical in TCGA database. Moreover, AR genomic coverage in prostate luminal cell-specific enhancer regions is decreased in tumor tissues compared with the paired adjacent normal tissue. Stable-expression of PDEF in PC3 cells restored the expression of canonical AR targets as well as the enhancer pattern similar to LNCaP cells. PDEF ChIP-seq analysis of multiple cell lines revealed that PDEF co-localize with H3K4me1. ChIP-qPCR confirmed that PDEF co-localized with AR at the PSA enhancer region. We hypothesize that PDEF is critical for maintaining prostate luminal specific enhancers. Expressing PDEF in LNCaP-abl cells also increased the transcription of canonical AR targets and inhibited the transcription of non-canonical AR targets. Independent of AR, we discovered that PDEF binds to the promoter region of CK18. Moreover, a positive correlation was observed between PDEF and CK18 in cell culture and prostate cancer samples in the TCGA database. Conclusion: These results show that PDEF plays an important role in the maintenance of canonical AR signature and luminal cell differentiation in prostate cancer in-part by rewiring the transcriptional program. Citation Format: Fengtian Wang, Hari K. Koul. Prostate-derived Etsfactor modulates AR-mediated gene expression and promotes luminal differentiation [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2019; 2019 Mar 29-Apr 3; Atlanta, GA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2019;79(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 5287.