Yes / Purpose – The extant gastronomy literature has rarely examined a connection between authentic gastronomic experiences and destinations. Specifically, ethnic enclaves, which are unique gastronomic and cultural destinations providing ethnic cuisine and cultural experiences to visitors, have been under-researched. Thus, the current study aims to address this knowledge gap. Design/methodology/approach – Employing a 2 (history: long vs short) x 2 (location: Central Business District [CBD] vs rural; main street vs alleyway) x 2 size/ownership type (big vs small; chain vs independent) between-subjects design, two experiments were conducted using a sample of 557 British consumers to test the effect of history, location, and size of ethnic enclaves and ethnic restaurants on consumers’ authentic cultural and gastronomic experiences in a UK context. Findings – In Study 1, ethnic enclave’s size affected consumers’ authentic cultural experiences. In Study 2, restaurants’ history and ownership type positively influenced consumers’ authentic gastronomic experiences. Both studies consistently reported the positive relationship between authentic experiences and behavioral intentions. Practical implications – For ethnic enclaves, the management team may consider expanding the size of ethnic enclaves to increase consumers’ authentic cultural experience. For those ethnic restaurants within the ethnic enclave, any independent or old ethnic restaurants should actively promote both characteristics in their marketing materials to create a feeling of offering authentic gastronomic experiences to customers. Originality/value – This study identified important ethnic enclave-related factors and ethnic restaurant-related factors forming consumers’ authentic cultural and gastronomic experiences.

Yes / Purpose – Drawing on signalling theory and focusing on independent restaurants, this research investigates how business signals (transparency information and exposure) affect business transparency, food authenticity, and ultimately purchase intentions. Design/methodology/approach – Using a 2x2 between-subject experimental design, Study 1 examines the recipe and an internet-famous restaurant, and Study 2 assesses the food supply chain and a celebrity-owned restaurant. Analysis of covariance and PROCESS is used to analyse the data. Findings – The results suggest that while revealing information on recipes and food supply chains positively affects business transparency, exposure has no significant impact. Additionally, secret recipes and revealed food supply chains contribute to higher food authenticity whilst being a celebrity owner or internet-famous restaurant negatively affects food authenticity. Research implications – Restaurant managers must be strategic and selective about the kinds of business signals they wish to reveal to customers. Secret recipes lead to higher food authenticity; whereas the revealed recipes and revealed food supply chains elicit higher business transparency. Independent restaurants should not rely on celebrity owners or seek internet fame, as neither type of exposure contributes to transparency or authenticity. Originality – This study advances the theoretical understanding of signalling theory relating to the determinants of transparency and food authenticity in a hospitality context. Contrary to previous studies, it reveals that exposure, as a transparency signal, has no impact on either business transparency or food authenticity. It extends knowledge and understanding of different types of independent restaurants, especially internet-famous restaurants.

Yes / Purpose: Restaurants’ outdoor signage plays an irreplaceable role in attracting potential diners, as it conveys important functional and symbolic meanings of the businesses. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of typographic design elements of outdoor signage on consumers’ perceptions of authenticity. This study also tests the linkage between authenticity and willingness to dine, as well as the moderating effect of frequency of dining in ethnic restaurants on the relationship. Design/methodology/approach: Using a 2 (simplified vs traditional Chinese characters) × 2 (calligraphy vs computer font) × 2 (vertical vs horizontal text flow) between-subject design, the authors did two experiments with 786 Chinese diners. Restaurant authenticity and willingness to dine are dependent variables, and openness to ethnic cuisine is the control variable. Findings: Display characters and text flow significantly affect restaurant authenticity. Furthermore, the results of this study demonstrate that display characters interact with typeface to influence restaurant authenticity. Consumers’ perceived authenticity significantly increases their willingness to dine. The frequency of dining in ethnic restaurants moderates the relationship between restaurant authenticity and willingness to dine. Practical implications: Ethnic restaurateurs should pay attention to the outdoor signage design, as it affects potential consumers’ authenticity perceptions. Specifically, in Mainland China, traditional Chinese characters and vertical text direction increase potential consumers’ authenticity perceptions. Originality/value: This study extends the semiotic theory and applies the cue–judgment–behavior model in the hospitality literature. This study also provides new understanding of authenticity by identifying the influence of typographic design on authenticity, which confirms the semiotic theory that certain semiotic cues affect consumers’ judgments.

Yes / Reshoring can be theorized as a brand revitalizing process for fostering companies’ ability to create value in the home country. The question of how to maintain sustainable reshoring implementation strategies by developing favorable brand responses is an important but underexplored field. Given that reshoring brand meanings are socially constructed and causally inferenced by consumers, we advocate that a reshoring brand revitalization should begin by understanding what constitutes customers’ attributions to reshoring motives. We identify values-driven, stakeholder-driven, and strategic-driven attributions as determinants of the sense of the institutionalization process (brand authenticity, legitimacy, and sustainability). These institutional logics comprise drivers that influence brand love and brand advocacy. We conduct an empirical study (n=1043) in China. The findings indicate that institutionalized reshoring branding activity is significantly influenced by customers’ attributions to underlying reshoring decisions. Reshoring brands that achieve institutional recognition are more likely to generate brand love and advocacy. In addition, our study provides empirical evidence that nostalgia (1) strengthens the influences of stakeholder-driven attributions on brand authenticity and sustainability, (2) inhibits the influence of values-driven attributions on brand authenticity, and (3) inhibits the influence of strategic-driven attributions on brand authenticity, legitimacy, and sustainability. Reshoring brand managers should consider these connections when designing their reshoring implementation strategies in the home country. / Major Humanities and Social Sciences Research Projects in Zhejiang higher education institutions (Grant No. 2023QN033), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 72101131,71972112) and Zhejiang Soft Science Programme (Grant No. 2022C35003) / The full-text of this article will be released for public view at the end of the publisher embargo on 30 Jun 2025.

Yes / Our global age is practically defined by the ubiquity of the Internet; the worldwide interconnection of cyber networks that facilitates accessibility to virtually all ICT and other elements of critical infrastructural facilities, with a click of a button. This is regardless of the user’s location and state of equilibrium; whether static or mobile. However, such interconnectivity is not without security consequences. A telecommunication system is indeed a communication system with the distinguishing key word, the Greek tele-, which means "at a distance," to imply that the source and sink of the system are at some distance apart. Its purpose is to transfer information from some source to a distant user; the key concepts being information, transmission and distance. These would require a means, each, to send, convey and receive the information with safety and some degree of fidelity that is acceptable to both the source and the sink. Chapter K begins with an effort to conceptualise the telecommunication network security environment, using relevant ITU-T2* recommendations and terminologies for secure telecommunications. The chapter is primarily concerned with the security aspect of computer-mediated telecommunications. Telecommunications should not be seen as an isolated phenomenon; it is a critical resource for the functioning of cross-industrial businesses in connection with IT. Hence, just as information, data or a computer/local computer-based network must have appropriate level of security, so also a telecommunication network must have equivalent security measures; these may often be the same as or similar to those for other ICT resources, e.g., password management. In view of the forgoing, the chapter provides a brief coverage of the subject matter by first assessing the context of security and the threat-scape. This is followed by an assessment of telecommunication network security requirements; identification of threats to the systems, the conceivable counter or mitigating measures and their implementation techniques. These bring into focus various cryptographic/crypt analytical concepts, vis a vis social engineering/socio-crypt analytical techniques and password management. The chapter noted that the human factor is the most critical factor in the security system for at least three possible reasons; it is the weakest link, the only factor that exercises initiatives, as well as the factor that transcends all the other elements of the entire system. This underscores the significance of social 2*International Telecommunications Union - Telecommunication Standardisation Sector 12 engineering in every facet of security arrangement. It is also noted that password security could be enhanced, if a balance is struck between having enough rules to maintain good security and not having too many rules that would compel users to take evasive actions which would, in turn, compromise security. The chapter is of the view that network security is inversely proportional to its complexity. In addition to the traditional authentication techniques, the chapter gives a reasonable attention to locationbased authentication. The chapter concludes that security solutions have a technological component, but security is fundamentally a people problem. This is because a security system is only as strong as its weakest link, while the weakest link of any security system is the human infrastructure. A projection for the future of telecommunication network security postulates that, network security would continue to get worse unless there is a change in the prevailing practice of externality or vicarious liability in the computer/security industry; where consumers of security products, as opposed to producers, bear the cost of security ineffectiveness. It is suggested that all transmission devices be made GPS-compliant, with inherent capabilities for location-based mutual authentication. This could enhance the future of telecommunication security. / Petroleum Technology Development Fund

No / The Raman spectra of two historical specimens of human hair attributed to the engineer Robert Stephenson and scientist Sir Isaac Newton, preserved in private collections are reported. Comparisons are made with the Raman spectra of modern hair specimens and with hair from archaeological excavations. The hair spectra collected with a laser excitation of 785 nm are of a better quality than those collected using 1064 nm. The historical hair specimens are remarkably well-defined spectroscopically in terms of the amide I vibrational mode and the ν(SS), ascribed to a predominantly gauche–gauche–gauche CSSC conformation. The contrast with degraded hair specimens recovered from archaeological excavations is striking. The presence of a weak feature near 2590 cm−1 in the hair samples attributed to a ν(SH) vibration could be indicative of a reduction process operative on the CSSC cystine keratotic linkages and a possible origin of this is bacterial biodegradation identified histologically. This study demonstrates the molecular information available from non-destructive Raman spectroscopic analysis from single hair shafts or small bundles of fibres which complements information available from histological and destructive analytical techniques for rare biological specimens subjected to conservation or curation procedures in museums or private collections.

Workplace authenticity for African Americans has received much attention in recent years, both in various research domains and in popular media. However, empirical research is scarce regarding what drives Blacks' decisions around whether to outwardly express their inner racial identity at work and what impact (in)authenticity has on workplace outcomes. The lack of empirical research is likely due, in part, to the fact that there are few existing measures designed to assess Blacks' workplace authenticity. Thus, the purpose of the current research was to develop and provide initial validation evidence for a situational judgment test (SJT), called the African American Workplace Authenticity Scale (AAWAS), aimed at measuring Blacks' propensity to use various identity negotiation strategies related to authenticity. Those identity negotiation strategies included identity shifting, referred to as code-switching by laypeople, avoidance, and authentic self-expression. The first phase of the research included item generation and refinement of the item pool using a web-based sample of Black working adults (n=207). For this phase, 38 items were created. Each item included one scenario and three response options each; each response option corresponded to one of the three aforementioned identity negotiation strategies, and each identity negotiation strategy is considered its own subscale. Furthermore, each scenario involved a situation wherein a Black individual was presented with pressure to conform to their White counterparts at work. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted to determine which items to retain, which resulted in a three-factor solution and the retention of 13 items. The second phase of the research involved gathering initial validation evidence for the 13-item scale, again using a web-based sample of Black working adults (n=252). For this phase, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and analysis of measurement invariance between genders was completed to determine whether the three-factor solution fit on a new sample and whether the scale can be used to make meaningful comparisons between males and females. Additionally, the relationships between the AAWAS and existing scales related to authenticity and response bias were explored using correlations. The CFA generally supported the three-factor solution, and metric invariance was found between males and females. Evidence for convergent and discriminant validity from the correlational analyses is presented. Moreover, the subscales of the AAWAS demonstrated good reliability according to rules of thumb for Cronbach's alpha (Identity Shifting Cronbach's α = 0.79, Avoiding Cronbach's α = 0.85, and Authentic Self-Expression Cronbach's α = 0.85). Overall, the AAWAS demonstrated promising psychometric properties thus far and has the potential to facilitate causal modeling in the area of workplace authenticity for Blacks with further validity evidence. / Doctor of Philosophy / Workplace authenticity for African Americans has received much attention in recent years, both in various research domains and in popular media. However, empirical research is scarce regarding what drives Blacks' decisions around whether to outwardly express their inner racial identity at work and what impact (in)authenticity has on workplace outcomes. The lack of empirical research is likely due, in part, to the fact that there are few existing measures designed to assess Blacks' workplace authenticity. The current research is focused on developing and providing initial validation evidence for a situational judgment test (SJT), called the African American Workplace Authenticity Scale (AAWAS), aimed at measuring Blacks' propensity to use various identity negotiation strategies related to authenticity.

The following thesis examine the former homes of Charlotte Berlin and Wilhelmina von Hallwyl, two women who in the turn of 20th century donated their homes and collections to be museums. The purpose of this essay is to examine how Charlotte Berlin’s Museum and the Hallwyl museum work with musealization and authenticity.Both Charlotte and Wilhelmina lived their life in a changing time, where emigration, industrialization and urbanization took place. They are both women from the upper-middle class but with differences such as economic ones which has an effect of the collection and the size of their homes. Further distinctions between them is that Wilhelmina was married and Charlotte was not. Wilhelmina lived in the capital of Sweden, Charlotte in the small town called Ystad. Their similarities is found in their collections of clocks, clothes, paintings and books but most of all in their determination to make their homes museums once they were gone. They sought to make sure that their changing time could be seen through their collection. By examine how this is visible in the rooms they left 137behind, it is possible to see the relationship between the props and the authentic objects. The signs of it now being a museum, as cordons and glass stands, collaborates with the presence of the former inhabitants as well as movemements, seen through objects like chairs placed slightly obliquely. This essay also establish a new term called affective authenticity, which describe and develop the sensation of the past, the relation between the imagi-nation and the reality and the connection between people, objects and the milieu, with the importance that every-thing does not have to be all authentic, but has to mediate it. This is a two year’s master thesis in Museum and Cultural Heritage Studies.

Syftet med följande studie var att undersöka Autenticitet i arbetet (Work Authenticity) och arbetstillsfredsställelse (Job Satisfaction) utifrån kvantitativ metod. Autenticitet i arbetet kan förstås som nivån av kongruens mellan en anställds internaliserade attityder och värderingar och dennes beteende utåt i en arbetskontext, d.v.s huruvida den anställda upplever att den agerar i enlighet med sitt inre. Arbetstillsfredsställelse har i detta arbete definierats som en positiv utvärdering av en individs upplevelser av olika dimensioner av sitt arbete eller arbetsplats. Utöver detta genomfördes en Scoping Review med syfte att utöka den konceptuella förståelsen kring Arbetsautenticitet som konstrukt och mått inom det aktuella forskningsfältet. Den huvudsakliga statistiska analysen som var målet för denna studie genomfördes med hjälp av data som samlats in via digitala självskattningsformulär (enkäter) som publicerades i diskussionsgrupper (Facebook) och forum på sociala medier för svensk vårdpersonal (n=130). Hypotesen var att höga nivåer av arbetsautenticitet (och låga nivåer av arbets(in)autenticitet) skulle korrelera med hög poäng på måttet för intern samt extern arbetstillsfredsställelse. Till följd av att det insamlade datamaterialet inte uppnådde samtliga antaganden för parametrisk testning genomfördes en uppsättning av Spearmans rangkorrelationstester. Små till måttliga signifikanta monotona korrelationer uppmättes mellan två av tre delskalor för Arbetsautenticitet (Authentic Living & Self-Alienation) till intern arbetstillsfredsställelse. En liten signifikant monoton korrelation uppmättes även mellan samma två delskalor av arbetsautenticitet och extern arbetstillsfredsställelse. Resultatet talar för tendenser till samband mellan höga nivåer av arbetsautenticitet och hög arbetstillsfredställese. Till följd av debegränsningar som en korrelationsstudie innebär så kan dock inga slutsatser kringorsakssamband dras utifrån det erhållna resultatet. Författaren önskar ändå att denna studie kan bistå med kunskap till framtida studier. En särskild del av diskussionen vigdes även åt att just diskutera implikationer för framtida studier med fokus på arbetsautenticitet och arbetstillsfredsställelse utifrån deras egenskaper som psykometriska mått och vetenskapliga konstrukt. Författaren presenterar även i den avslutande diskussion ett förslag på en möjlig utformning av en experimentell studiedesign, med målet att bidra med implikationer till framtida utforskning inom området. / The aim of this study was to explore the construct of work authenticity and its relationship to intrinsic and extrinsic job satisfaction using a quantitative approach. Work authenticity can be understood as the correspondence between a worker’s inner values and experiences and her outward behavior in the work place and job satisfaction as a positive appraisal of one’s job or job experiences. In addition, a scoping review was carried out with the purpose of outlining current research on authenticity primarily focused on the statistical measures used. The analysis was carried out using data gathered from a sample consisting of Swedish healthcare professionals (n=130) recruited by the use of relevant social media forums & discussion groups (Facebook) through digital self-report-forms. The forms were constructed using two statistical measures; IAM-Work (Individual Measure of Authenticity at Work) and MSQ-SF (Minnesota Job Satisfaction Questionnaire, Short-Form). It was hypothesized that measures connected lack of work authenticity (Self-Alienation & Accepting External Influence) would be inversely correlated to measures describing high levels of job satisfaction. It was also predicted that measures of experienced work authenticity would be positively correlated with a measure of job satisfaction. Due to the data gathered not fulfilling conditions for parametric testing a series of Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient tests were carried out. Small to moderate significant monotonic correlations were found between sub-measures of work authenticity (Authentic Living & Self Alienation) and the intrinsic job satisfaction-measure together with small significant monotonic correlations to extrinsic job satisfaction. The findings presented in thisstudy supports a possible relationship between higher levels of work authenticity to higher levels of job satisfaction. Due to the innate limitations of correlational research, no conclusions regarding causality within the identified relationships could be established. However, the wish of the author is that the this study nonetheless will act as a contribution to the exploration of this topic. In the final discussion, the psychometric measures and theoretical constructs of authenticity and job satisfaction were evaluated. Lastly, the author outlines suggestions for a possible experimental study design with the aim of providing implications for future research.

The research question addressed by this thesis is: To what degree the results of the statistical analysis will corroborate the main theoretical assumptions of the proposed theoretical model of new authentic transformatory cultural tourism experience as transmodern phenomenon of equality of two Cartesian levels of reality, material (objective authenticity) and experiential (constructive authenticity) in informing the intrapersonal existential authenticity as outcome transformatory tourist experience. The main reason for undertaking this study is to resolve the evident crisis of postmodern authenticity discourse arising from a failure of postmodern theoretical framework to integrate three social authenticity theories into a coherent authenticity discourse. The research design adopted in the study is theory-testing theory-building paradigm which incorporates both deductive and inductive logic and was applied in three successive phases. In the first phase the new theoretical model of transformatory cultural tourism experience was proposed, underpinned by transmodern flat ontology and philosophy of the Speculative Realism. In the second phase the main theoretical assumptions of equal contribution of objective and constructive authenticity as independent variables in informing the transformatory experience as dependent variable were empirically tested by standard multiple regression analysis. In the last deductive phase the results of all empirical tests were inferred onto initial theoretical assumptions of the original model and new modified model of transformatory cultural tourism experience has been proposed with an addition of two newly identified transmodern experiential constructs, epistemological and ontological authenticity. For a primary data collection the instrument was a self-administered questionnaire and the sampling strategy was a non-probability sampling. The data was collected during the period 01st and 18 April 2011 at two sites, Constitution Hill and Hector Peterson Memorial in Johannesburg. The sample size from two sites was N=406. The scales of measurements were already developed in the earlier questionnaire and the confirmatory factor analysis was used to confirm the variables contained in each factor, namely objective and constructive authenticity as independent variables and transformatory experience as the dependent variable. The results of a standard multiple regression analysis confirmed the importance of the model as independent variables explained 30.7% of the variances (R2=.307) in the model. An unexpected result was that objective authenticity explained 34.5% of the variance in the model (β = .345) which is significantly higher than 30.5% of variance explained by constructive authenticity (β = .305). The results of standard multiple regression analysis confirmed the main theoretical assumption of the model of equality of material and experiential levels of Cartesian duality in informing the new transformatory experience regarded as a transmodern phenomenon. The standard, stepwise and hierarchical multiple regression tests were further conducted to establish if any moderating variables should be added into the original model containing two independent variables. The tests included five demographic variables (gender, place of residence, connection with culture, and two items of education (pre-tertiary education and Bachelors degree) and none of the variables explained a level of variability which warranted their inclusion into the model. Consequently, the results of the retests of the model did not change its initial conceptualisation. Finally, the t-test and Mann-Whitney U tests identified a significant difference between the two groups in the level of authenticity of their experience derived from two sites. A group having stronger inclination for authenticity is identified as Cultural Creatives, who are known as the forerunners of transmodernism. Based on the results of all statistical tests the final model was modified to reflect the important theoretical findings pertaining to two new types of transmodern authenticity. Epistemological authenticity denotes combined effects of objective and constructive authenticity in feeding the ontological authenticity of transformatory experience. The ontological authenticity is further identified as a confirmation of authentic-self which is required by Cultural Creatives. With proposition of new modified model the theory-testing theory-building research design came to its conclusion. The importance of research findings presented in this study lies not only in resolving the current crises of authenticity discourse in tourism but in the proposed New theoretical and conceptual model of transformatory cultural tourism experience underpinned by objective ·and constructive authenticity which will open a whole new field in tourism research arising from new transmodern experiential paradigm. / PhD (Tourism Management), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014