Gestire un museo: standard e modelli della qualita a confronto

Il museo è un’organizzazione che offre servizi educativi e culturali. Tradizionalmente queste istituzioni hanno goduto di un’autolegittimazione derivante, soprattutto per quanto riguarda i musei d’arte, dal prestigio delle collezioni sottoposte alla loro tutela; tuttavia, nel corso del tempo tale autoreferenzialità è giunta a logorarsi a causa di motivi vari primi fra tutti la diminuzione del finanziamento pubblico, sebbene imputabile a fenomeni di carattere generale di riduzione della spesa pubblica, e la crescita delle attese di servizio da parte dei fruitori. L’obiettivo del presente lavoro consiste nell’illustrare i principali modelli teorici che consentono di elaborare una rappresentazione chiara e completa delle finalità perseguite, delle attività svolte e dei risultati raggiunti da un museo. La descrizione dei principali modelli organizzativo-gestionali (nello specifico il sistema di accreditamento utilizzato nel Regno Unito e Modello EFQM per l’Eccellenza applicato ai musei) è accompagnata dall’esposizione dei casi più significativi dell’adozione di tali modelli, mettendo in luce i vantaggi dell’una o dell’altra soluzione gestionale. Nello specifico, la discussione si apre con l’analisi dell’Accreditation Scheme inglese ed un focus sulla valutazione dei risultati raggiunti dai musei nell’ambito della perfomance sulla sostenibilità ambientale, per poi passare al sistema di indicatori elaborati dal Department for culture, media and sports e al relativo sistema di reporting. Successivamente, l’analisi procede con l’esame del Piano Strategico 2001- 2004 del Museo Guggenheim di Bilbao che in quel periodo ha sperimentato il Modello EFQM, non prima di aver acceso un riflettore sulla pionieristica esperienza della riscrittura dei principi di Total Quality Management applicato ai musei avvenuta in ambito italiano. Infine, l’elaborato affronta la situazione italiana che prevede modelli regionali di riconoscimento dei musei e l’uso dello strumento della Carta dei servizi che costituisce, nelle intenzioni del legislatore, un vero e proprio patto con il cittadino riguardo i livelli qualitativi minimi che l’ente pubblico erogatore di servizi, nel nostro caso il museo, deve garantire all’utente. Il lavoro mira a comprendere se e come sia possibile misurare a valutare le politiche di gestione dei musei che al di la della loro natura giuridica, ovvero sia che si tratti di un ente pubblico o di una fondazione, hanno come finalità erogare un bene di natura intangibile: un’esperienza culturale ed emozionale

Olfaction and gustation in blindness: a state of the art of the literature

To date, there are quite a few studies assessing olfaction and gustation in blindness, with great variability in sample size, participants' age, blindness onset and smell and taste evaluation methods. Indeed, the evaluation of olfactory and gustatory performance can differ depending on several factors, including cultural differences. Therefore, here we analysed through a narrative review, all the works reporting a smell and taste assessment in blind individuals during the last 130 years, trying to summarize and address the knowledge in this field

METROPOLITAN AGRICULTURE, SOCIO-DEMOGRAPHIC DYNAMICS AND THE FOOD-CITY RELATIONSHIP IN SOUTHERN EUROPE

Peri-urban agriculture is a pivotal issue in the debate on sustainable management of land in metropolitan regions worldwide. Multiple socioeconomic and environmental solutions introduced by new models of peri-urban agriculture are playing an important role in planning and management of fringe land. The recent development of peri-urban agriculture in Southern European cities was supposed to reflect latent, crisis-driven processes of 'coming back to land': new land has been extensively cultivated, and new relations have been created between farmers, communities and territories within peri-urban areas. This study describes some relevant experiences of peri-urban farming in 6 metropolitan regions (Lisbon, Barcelona, Marseille, Rome, Athens, Istanbul) representative of different socioeconomic contexts in Southern Europe, outlining strengths and weaknesses in the use of fringe land for cropping, and evidencing relevant implications for urban sustainability

Dataset of Verbal evaluation of Umami taste in Europe

The data presented here includes verbal descriptors used by Finnish, German and Italian subjects to express the quality of an umami taste solution offered in a blind fashion. The dataset refers to the research article “A cross-cultural survey of Umami Familiarity in European Countries” [1]. Data shows that a total of 106 different classes of words, including synonyms, were used by the Finnish group, 64 different classes of words, including synonyms, were used by the German group, and a total of 70 different classes of words, including synonyms, were used by the Italian group. The descriptors are reported in Excel tables and visualized in a bar graph where the length of the bars indicates the number of given answers for each class.Peer reviewe

Perché e come promuovere la camminabilitá urbana a partire dalle esigenze degli abitanti piú svantaggiati: il progetto "Extrapedestri. Lasciati conquistare dalla mobilità aliena!"

La città contemporanea è una città a misura di automobilista. Chi non vuole o non può usare l'automobile per spostarsi non è in grado di esercitare pienamente il proprio diritto urbano di accesso ed uso degli spazi e delle strade sottratti dalle automobili all'uso pubblico e collettivo. Il prerequisito per la riconquista di questo diritto urbano negato è la promozione di un vero e proprio cambiamento culturale in materia di mobilità, attraverso il coinvolgimento consapevole e responsabile degli abitanti nelle politiche e nei progetti di promozione della mobilità altra, in particolare di coloro che subiscono la maggior parte delle conseguenze negative determinate dalla presenza invasiva delle automobili nella città: bambini, anziani, persone disabili e pedoni (e ciclisti) in generale. Nell'articolo descriveremo il progetto pilota "Extrapedestri. Lasciati conquistare dalla mobilità aliena!" che si pone l'obiettivo di promuovere la camminabilità urbana di due quartieri marginali della città di Sassari (e, in prospettiva, di tutta la città, trattandosi un progetto facilmente replicabile) a partire dalle esigenze, dai desideri e dalla "capacità di disobbedienza" dei bambini, uno dei gruppi di abitanti più svantaggiati in materia di mobilità.Contemporary city is a car-friendly city. Those who cannot or do not want to use a car are not capable to fully exercise their fundamental urban right to access and to use the public spaces and the streets. In this paper, we argue that it is possible to make more effective policies aimed at building walkable cities making reference to the desires and needs of disadvantaged groups. In particular, we concentrate on children as one of the most vulnerable groups of inhabitants of the city. The role children can play in improving urban quality of life is fundamental, for a number of reasons, most important of which, for the purpose of this paper, is their "capability of disobedience" which might be used as a force of urban transformation. Then, we present one project through which we try to promote the urban walkability of the city of Sassari starting from children's involvement: "ExtraPedestrians: let yourself be conquered by the 'alien' mobility".Peer Reviewe

Pain, smell, and taste in adults: a narrative review of multisensory perception and interaction

Every day our sensory systems perceive and integrate a variety of stimuli containing information vital for our survival. Pain acts as a protective warning system, eliciting a response to remove harmful stimuli; it may also be a symptom of an illness or present as a disease itself. There is a growing need for additional pain-relieving therapies involving the multisensory integration of smell and taste in pain modulation, an approach that may provide new strategies for the treatment and management of pain. While pain, smell, and taste share common features and are strongly linked to emotion and cognition, their interaction has been poorly explored. In this review, we provide an overview of the literature on pain modulation by olfactory and gustatory substances. It includes adult human studies investigating measures of pain threshold, tolerance, intensity, and/or unpleasantness. Due to the limited number of studies currently available, we have structured this review as a narrative in which we comment on experimentally induced and clinical pain separately on pain-smell and pain-taste interaction. Inconsistent study findings notwithstanding, pain, smell, and taste seem to interact at both the behavioral and the neural levels. Pain intensity and unpleasantness seem to be affected more by olfactory substances, whereas pain threshold and tolerance are influenced by gustatory substances. Few pilot studies to date have investigated these effects in clinical populations. While the current results are promising for the future, more evidence is needed to elucidate the link between the chemical senses and pain. Doing so has the potential to improve and develop novel options for pain treatment

Investigating body composition in wheelchair athletes

Subjects with spinal cord injury (SCI) are at risk for adverse changes in body composition (BC), which are harmful for their health and relevant to sport performance. This study investigated whole-body and regional BC in wheelchair athletes (WA) by comparing tetraplegic and paraplegic WA with a larger sample of healthy males athletes. Dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) was used by one operator to measure subtotal (total-body less head) and regional (arms, legs and trunk) body composition (lean mass [LM], bone mineral content [BMC], fat mass [FM] and fat mass percentage [%FM]) in twenty-seven male WA aged 30.0±9.4y with chronic SCI. WA were classified as tetraplegic (lesion above T1; Tetra, n=10) and paraplegic (lesion at T1 and below; Para, n=17) and matched each to three healthy males athletes (n=81) on the basis of DXA area and BMI. BC outcomes were compared in Tetra and Para as well as Tetra and Para, and their respective control with the t-test for independent samples. Alpha value was set at 0.05 and p-values corrected for multiple comparisons (pc; Benjamini and Hochberg procedure). Percent FM was significant higher in Tetra vs. Para at the subtotal and regional level (0.02

Unpleasant olfactory and gustatory stimuli increase pain unpleasantness in patients with chronic oral burning pain: an exploratory study

Background: Despite mounting evidence for the powerful influence of smell and taste substances in experimental pain, our knowledge of their effects in the clinical context is scarce, especially for patients with chronic oral burning pain. To fill this gap, we investigated the effect of olfactory and gustatory stimuli on pain perception in patients with chronic oral burning pain, a disabling condition that is difficult to manage and treat. Methods: Twenty-two patients with chronic oral burning pain underwent testing with a variety of olfactory and gustatory substances (pleasant, neutral, unpleasant) in multisensory interaction. The order of testing was randomized. Perception of pain intensity and unpleasantness was evaluated on a numerical rating scale at baseline and immediately after each test trial. Results: Pain unpleasantness but not pain intensity was found to be modulated by chemosensory stimuli. Unpleasant olfactory and gustatory stimuli increased the perception of pain unpleasantness compared to pleasant and neutral stimuli. Pain unpleasantness after unpleasant olfactory and gustatory stimuli correlated with psychological questionnaire subscale scores for distress (CORE-OM) and emotional awareness (TAS-20). Conclusions: Our findings suggest a role of unpleasant chemosensory stimuli in increasing the perception of pain unpleasantness in patients with chronic oral burning. The lack of an effect on pain intensity indicates a dissociation between sensory and affective pain components. Future research is needed to further study the association between chemosensory stimuli and emotional and subjective aspects in modulating chronic oral burning pain

Hedonicity in functional motor disorders: a chemosensory study assessing taste

The aim of this study was to explore hedonicity to basic tastes in patients with functional motor disorders (FMDs) that are often associated with impairment in emotional processing. We recruited 20 FMD patients and 24 healthy subjects, matched for age and sex. Subjects were asked to rate the hedonic sensation (i.e., pleasant, neutral, and unpleasant) on a\u2009-\u200910 to +10 scale to the four basic tastes (sweet, sour, salty, and bitter) at different concentrations, and neutral stimuli (i.e., no taste stimulation) by means of the Taste Strips Test. Anxiety, depression, and alexithymia were assessed. FMD patients rated the highest concentration of sweet taste (6.7\u2009\ub1\u20092.6) as significantly more pleasant than controls (4.7\u2009\ub1\u20092.5, p\u2009=\u20090.03), and the neutral stimuli significantly more unpleasant (patients:\u2009-\u20090.7\u2009\ub1\u20090.4, controls: 0.1\u2009\ub1\u20090.4, p\u2009=\u20090.013). Hedonic ratings were not correlated to anxiety, depression, or alexithymia scores. Hedonic response to taste is altered in FMD patients. This preliminary finding might result from abnormal interaction between sensory processing and emotional valence

Bitter tastants and artificial sweeteners activate a subset of epithelial cells in acute tissue slices of the rat trachea

Bitter and sweet receptors (T2Rs and T1Rs) are expressed in many extra-oral tissues including upper and lower airways. To investigate if bitter tastants and artificial sweeteners could activate physiological responses in tracheal epithelial cells we performed confocal Ca2+ imaging recordings on acute tracheal slices. We stimulated the cells with denatonium benzoate, a T2R agonist, and with the artificial sweeteners sucralose, saccharin and acesulfame-K. To test cell viability we measured responses to ATP. We found that 39% of the epithelial cells responding to ATP also responded to bitter stimulation with denatonium benzoate. Moreover, artificial sweeteners activated different percentages of the cells, ranging from 5% for sucralose to 26% for saccharin, and 27% for acesulfame-K. By using carbenoxolone, a gap junction blocker, we excluded that responses were mainly mediated by Ca2+ waves through cell-to-cell junctions. Pharmacological experiments showed that both denatonium and artificial sweeteners induced a PLC-mediated release of Ca2+ from internal stores. In addition, bitter tastants and artificial sweeteners activated a partially overlapping subpopulation of tracheal epithelial cells. Our results provide new evidence that a subset of ATP-responsive tracheal epithelial cells from rat are activated by both bitter tastants and artificial sweeteners