Identification of factors of indigenous ethnic identity: A case study on the waorani amazonian ethnicity

Abstract

Latin American Indians have undergone changes in their cultural identity, especially as a result of contact with Western cultures. In order to determine the degree of change in cultural identity, the authors have recently developed an instrument designed from an indigenous perspective that provides information on 30 subdimensions and 5 cultural dimensions and was successfully tested for validity and reliability. In this paper, the instrument is analyzed from an Artificial Intelligence point of view in order to automatically classify the individuals and to provide a subspace of it able to identify the weights of the subcomponents of this instrument in regard to its contribution to the Waorani identity. The systematic application of the instrument together with the AI-based system can provide decision-makers with valuable information about which aspects of their identity are most sensitive to change and thus help design development policies that minimally interfere with their ethnic identity.