This paper describes an educational experience realized in the form of extracurricular workshops involving music technology students of the "V. Gambara" music high school in Brescia (Italy). By means of a participatory prototyping experience, the project aimed at fostering the students awareness and understanding of technological means…

In the last few years, several initiatives based on extracurricular activities have been organized in many countries around the world, with the aim to reduce the digital gender gap in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) fields. Among them, the Digital Girls summer camp, organized every year since 2014 by two Italian universities with the…

A positive transition to secondary school is pivotal to adolescents' mental health and success. However, the school transition research has mainly focused on transition-related adversities rather than adolescent wellbeing and adaptation. While the disturbing consequences of a difficult school transition are known, little attention has been paid to…

Climate change is one of the significant global challenges currently facing humanity. Even though its seriousness seems to be common knowledge among the public, the reaction of individuals to it has been slow and uncertain. Many studies assert that simply knowing about climate change is not enough to generate people's behavioural response. They…

In reaction to the OECD-wide declining trend in scientific enrollments, the Italian government launched a policy in 2005 to promote the study of science at the university. The policy promoted extra-curricular activities for secondary school students in Chemistry, Physics, Math and Materials Science. This article evaluates the policy impact on…

Our recent project has a comparative perspective: it compares selected good practices of integration of ethnic minority children among three European countries (Italy, Switzerland and Hungary). The project examines several key areas of integration: governmental policies, NGO practices and most importantly good practices that might be transferable,…

In a cross-national replication and extension of prior research with American students, Italian middle and high school students completed measures of interests and competency beliefs relative to a variety of school- and nonschool-related activities. Both interests and competency beliefs tended to show greater adherence to circumplex Realistic,…

A recently formulated correspondence hypothesis states that influence style effectiveness depends on how it fits in with the communication contract activated in the context of influence: almost symmetrical relationships require respectful styles, while authoritarian styles are more effective when the social distance between the influence source…