Psycho-Behavioral Mechanisms of Ethnic Interaction, Exchange, and Integration in Tourism Spheres: A Mixed-Methods Study of Deyang and the Western Sichuan Ethnic Corridor

Abstract

Taking Deyang and the Western Sichuan Ethnic Corridor as its geographic setting, this study draws on ten publicly documented cases selected for regional relevance and continuity of source material. A retrospective multi-case process design is used to reconstruct each case along a four-link chain: field opportunity, interaction process, psychological turning point, and identity consolidation. The cases span post-disaster reconstruction, festival tourism, old-town commerce, enclave economy, vocational education, historical trade routes, urban ethnic commerce, archaeological heritage, and ethnic-unity program development. Findings show that mere co-presence evolves into emotional safety, reciprocal trust, a sense of gain, and shared memory only when sustained by joint tasks, cultural participation, shared benefits, and public services. The tourism field accordingly performs four functions—aggregation, transformation, amplification, and sedimentation. Cross-case comparison identifies five psychological entry points: post-disaster recovery, festival-based empathy, institutional collaboration, historical reciprocity, and cultural identification, through which interaction, exchange, and integration among ethnic groups move from initial encounter toward mutual understanding, trust, and shared meaning.