After the first lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic: Perceptions, experiences, and effects on well-being in Italian people

BackgroundSince the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent measures of containment, multiple studies have been conducted aimed at assessing the impacts on people’s psychophysical well-being; however, few studies have investigated the general population’s perceptions, experiences, and effects by adopting a mixed-method approach.MethodsA total of 855 Italian participants completed an online survey, conducted in the period following the first lockdown in Italy. Psychological well-being, perceived stress and COVID-19-related fears were assessed by standardized questionnaires (Psychological General Well-Being Index-Short version, Perceived Stress Scale 10, and Multidimensional Assessment of COVID-19-Related Fears). The process of sense-making of the experience during the lockdown period was also evaluated by means of an open-ended question.ResultsParticipants reported a lower level of general well-being, and a higher level of both perceived stress and COVID-19-related fear during the lockdown period compared to the time of the survey (1 month after the resumption of activities). The thematic analysis of responses to the open-ended question revealed two factors and five clusters, which explain the thematic variance among the narratives: the first factor refers to the type of experience (emotional states and feelings vs. objective descriptions of daily activities), while the second concerns positive or negative connotations of the experiences reported.ConclusionsThis study explored the psychological impact of the first lockdown on people’s well-being, and described the process of making sense of the experience during the lockdown 1 month after going back to previous habits. Results highlighted the effectiveness of the mixed-method approach for an in-depth and exhaustive investigation of people’s psychological condition during and after the first lockdown

EVALITA Evaluation of NLP and Speech Tools for Italian - December 17th, 2020

Welcome to EVALITA 2020! EVALITA is the evaluation campaign of Natural Language Processing and Speech Tools for Italian. EVALITA is an initiative of the Italian Association for Computational Linguistics (AILC, http://www.ai-lc.it) and it is endorsed by the Italian Association for Artificial Intelligence (AIxIA, http://www.aixia.it) and the Italian Association for Speech Sciences (AISV, http://www.aisv.it)

Risk perception and personality: a study in the transportation sector

Socio-demographics, work, and emotional factors, together with experience of specific hazards, seem to play a joint role in the process of risk perception. Objective. The present study of 96 transport sector workers was carried out with the aim of verifying the role of personality in emotional states that moderate the process of risk perception and, more particularly, the perception of qualitative aspects of risk. Methods. The research, with a correlational design, analysed the personalities of the workers (measured through the Big Five Questionnaire), demographics and work factors, qualitative aspects of risk, perceived risk level, and other variables of interest, measured through ad hoc scales and items. The study was aimed at evaluating the existence of a relationship between perception of the qualitative aspects of risk and the following variables: (Hp1) personality, (Hp2) socio-demographic variables, (Hp3) self-perceived knowledge of safety regulations, (Hp4) satisfaction, (Hp5) perceived quality of life. Results. The results only partially confirmed the Hp1, and not for all the risk dimensions; moreover, they confirmed that age and length of service lead to a "presumption of control" effect (Hp2), while no gender differences were found. The Hp3 and Hp5 hypotheses were not confirmed, while satisfaction was a good predictor of the global level of perceived risk. Conclusions. Jointly, personality factors are excellent predictors of specific qualitative risk dimensions, but it will be important to regularly verify their role and contribution in the emotional factors that affect the perception of risk

Orientare alla scelta in un mondo complesso: l'esperienza del progetto ORIENTATIVAmente

Il lavoro che presentiamo riguarda un progetto di orientamento scolastico svoltosi nell'arco di un decennio all'interno di alcune scuole medie inferiori della provincia di Barletta-Andria-Trani. La particolarità di questo progetto sta nell' aver cercato, in un'ottica della complessità, di integrare diversi livelli di sistema: individuo, classe, docenti, famiglie, scuole medie superiori. Accanto alla tradizionale visione dell'orientamento come processo di apprendimento e crescita abbiamo affiancato la visione dell'orientamento come prevenzione e promozione del benessere individuale e contestuale. Tale intervento, pertanto, viene a configurarsi come un vero e proprio intervento di comunità, teso a prevenire e migliorare la qualità di vita. Durante questo decennio abbiamo sviluppato e perfezionato una serie di metodi tra cui in particolare il microcounselling familiare, con lo scopo di contenere i costi e ridurre i tempi (la durata era di circa 15 minuti a famiglia), garantendo una elevata qualità ed efficacia dell'intervento. Proprio perché Micro e legato ad un vincolo temporale, questo tipo di intervento è molto strutturato, è applicabile in situazioni a bassa problematicità ed ha senso solo se inserito in contesti di intervento più ampi. I risultati a lungo termine sono soddisfacenti, con bassissime percentuali di dispersione, insuccesso, e/o disagio scolastico. (<2%