Competitive Branding Policies for Medium Mountain Tourism Destinations: a Case Study from the Val Di Sole (Trento)

The aim of this essay is to address the issue of medium mountain destination branding from a multidisciplinary perspective, focusing on the Italian tourism area of the Val di Sole as a case study.After having summarized the main potentialities and constraints in medium mountain tourism management, the research applies the many-sided concept of in-between place to the destination branding aspects. Finally, the analysis of destination branding policies carried out in the Val di Sole, a medium mountain Alpine area in the Italian Provincia Autonoma of Trento, offers an overview of the basic success factors in medium mountain destinations enhancement.Nel presente contributo intendiamo affrontare il tema del destination branding applicato alle aree turistiche di mezza montagna, adottando una prospettiva multidisciplinare.Per meglio definire gli aspetti operativo gestionali delle branding policies, si è scelto di concentrare l'attenzione su un case study individuato nell'area della Val di Sole, collocata nel settore nord-occidentale della provincia di Trento, dove negli ultimi anni sono state implementate politiche di marchio turistico specificatamente orientate a potenziare un'offerta alternativa rispetto a quella basata sulle stazioni sciistiche in quota.Dopo aver ricapitolato le principali potenzialità e criticità nella valorizzazione turistica delle aree di mezza montagna, riferendosi sia al contesto italiano che a quello europeo, si propone l'utilizzo della categoria di in-between place, adottata diffusamente nell'ambito delle scienze sociali e territoriali secondo diverse declinazioni e da noi applicata al processo di destination branding nelle aree di mezza montagna

Atypical odontalgia and trigeminal neuralgia: psychological, behavioural and psychopharmacologic approach – an overview of the pathologies related to the challenging differential diagnosis in orofacial pain

Orofacial pain represents a challenge for dentists, especially if with a non-odontogenic basis. Orofacial neuropathic pain is chronic, arduous to localize and develops without obvious pathology. Comorbid psychiatric disorders, such as anxiety and depression, coexist and negatively affect the condition. This article presents one case of atypical odontalgia and one of trigeminal neuralgia treated with psychological and psychopharmacologic tailored and adapted therapies, after conventional medications had failed. In addition, an overview of the pathologies related to the challenging differential diagnosis in orofacial pain is given, since current data are insufficient. A 68-year-old male complained of chronic throbbing, burning pain in a maxillary tooth, worsening upon digital pressure. Symptoms did not abate after conventional amitriptyline therapy; psychological intervention and antianxiety drug were supplemented and antidepressant agent dosage incremented; the patient revealed improvement and satisfaction with the multidisciplinary approach to his pathology. A 72-year-old male lamented chronic stabbing, intermittent, sharp, shooting and electric shock-like pain in an upper tooth, radiating and following the distribution of the trigeminal nerve. Pain did not recur after psychological intervention and a prescription of antidepressant and antianxiety agents, while conventional carbamazepine therapy had not been sufficient to control pain. Due to concern with comorbid psychiatric disorders, we adopted a patient-centered, tailored and balanced therapy, favourably changing the clinical outcome. Comorbid psychiatric disorders have a negative impact on orofacial pain and dentists should consider adopting tailored therapies, such as psychological counselling and behavioural and psychopharmacologic strategies, besides conventional treatments. They also need to be familiar with the signs and symptoms of orofacial pain, recollecting a comprehensive view of the pathologies concerning the differential diagnosis. A prompt diagnosis prevents pain chronicity, avoiding an increase in complexity and a shift to orofacial neuropathic pain and legal claims

The Breakthrough of Tourism in a Rurbanised Area: Territorial Changes and Conflicts in the Val di Magra (1945–1975)

This article aims to contribute to filling a research gap in current environ- mental history, since the effects of the spread of mass tourism on urban-rural relations in Mediterranean floodplains throughout the trente glorieuses of mass consumption (1945–1975) have hitherto attracted little scholarly attention. The study therefore focuses on the environmental conflicts engendered by the attempts to increase mass tourism through construction of a bridge and zoning of the promontory of Montemarcello at the mouth of the River Magra, a coastal area in north-west Italy. A twofold perspective is applied to analyse both the tangible transformations of the riverine landscape and the intangible values of the river’s natural heritage according to the advocates of traditional landscapes and the supporters of modernisation. By tracing the key environmental impacts of tourism while reconstructing the nar- ratives of place according to different stakeholders, the article’s goal is to bridge the gap between the “cultural” and the “material” approach in the environmental history of urban-rural relations.This article aims to contribute to filling a research gap in current environ- mental history, since the effects of the spread of mass tourism on urban-rural relations in Mediterranean floodplains throughout the trente glorieuses of mass consumption (1945–1975) have hitherto attracted little scholarly attention. The study therefore focuses on the environmental conflicts engendered by the attempts to increase mass tourism through construction of a bridge and zoning of the promontory of Montemarcello at the mouth of the River Magra, a coastal area in north-west Italy. A twofold perspective is applied to analyse both the tangible transformations of the riverine landscape and the intangible values of the river’s natural heritage according to the advocates of traditional landscapes and the supporters of modernisation. By tracing the key environmental impacts of tourism while reconstructing the nar- ratives of place according to different stakeholders, the article’s goal is to bridge the gap between the “cultural” and the “material” approach in the environmental history of urban-rural relations

Predicting human mobility through the assimilation of social media traces into mobility models

Predicting human mobility flows at different spatial scales is challenged by the heterogeneity of individual trajectories and the multi-scale nature of transportation networks. As vast amounts of digital traces of human behaviour become available, an opportunity arises to improve mobility models by integrating into them proxy data on mobility collected by a variety of digital platforms and location-aware services. Here we propose a hybrid model of human mobility that integrates a large-scale publicly available dataset from a popular photo-sharing system with the classical gravity model, under a stacked regression procedure. We validate the performance and generalizability of our approach using two ground-truth datasets on air travel and daily commuting in the United States: using two different cross-validation schemes we show that the hybrid model affords enhanced mobility prediction at both spatial scales.Comment: 17 pages, 10 figure

The Touristification of War Landscapes in the Province of Trento

The paper aims to investigate the impact of the so-called touristification of the war landscapes in the Province of Trento (Italy), focusing on the role played by local communities.Due to the increasing interest by tourists in visiting former battlefields and places that display cultural heritage referring to conflicts and wars, contemporary social sciences consider war tourism as a complex blend between social memory and tourism exploitation of territorial resources.After a brief summary on the academic debate about the link between Great War heritage and tourism, the essay assesses the main features of war landscapes in Trentino (Italy) and provides some suggestions for further research

A case series analysing patients with dental anxiety: a patient-centred model based on psychological profiling

Anxiety and distress can jeopardize dental care experience of patients and may affect the clinical result. Although a wide range of sedation and analgesia techniques are currently available to relieve distress and pain during dental procedures, operative models to choose the most effective sedation-analgesic strategies are lacking. This case series proposes a patient-centred model to optimize patients' cooperation during dental care delivery. We describe how to achieve correct anaesthesia by using the least sedative procedure, accounting for the dental procedure needed and patient's psychological profile. Five patients were considered as paradigmatic to show the balance between patients' subjective experiences and the clinical procedures: a patient with low stress, good compliance (case 1); moderate stress and reduction in compliance (case 2); anxious patient (case 3); patient with acute anxiety and emotional distress (case 4); anguished patient (case 5). A multimodal treatment of emotional and behavioural condition and a patient-centred model approach contributed to achieve the best patient satisfaction in the five cases detailed here

The Scaling of Human Contacts in Reaction-Diffusion Processes on Heterogeneous Metapopulation Networks

We present new empirical evidence, based on millions of interactions on Twitter, confirming that human contacts scale with population sizes. We integrate such observations into a reaction-diffusion metapopulation framework providing an analytical expression for the global invasion threshold of a contagion process. Remarkably, the scaling of human contacts is found to facilitate the spreading dynamics. Our results show that the scaling properties of human interactions can significantly affect dynamical processes mediated by human contacts such as the spread of diseases, and ideas

Media coverage of large countries at the 2015 Milan EXPO

An inertial bias or status quo bias in media industries, as in other markets, means the perpetuation of a certain behaviour or attitude. If mass media frequently address certain issues, an inertial bias means that such issues will be treated again independently of their absolute or relative newsworthiness. This paper studies the inertial media bias in relation to the Milan Expo 2015, an event where, in theory, all participant countries ought to have been considered equal. The empirical analysis considers the articles and reports on the Expo of the two most important online Italian newspapers, Repubblica and Corriere della Sera between May and October 2015. The estimates show that the newspapers devoted more articles and words to the largest countries, while the slant towards the richest countries was less evident. In addition, the tone of the media reports regarding large and rich countries was more positive

Healthy and environment-friendly: the rise of sustainable food consumption through the pages of «La Cucina Italiana» (1952-2017)

L'articolo indaga la comparsa di pratiche sostenibili nei consumi domestici, allo scopo di analizzare quando e con quali modalità La Cucina Italiana, la più conosciuta rivista di cucina italiana, ha promosso o, al contrario, ostacolato la diffusione di abitudini alimentari sostenibili e, più in generale, l'affermazione di modelli di consumo consapevole nell'Italia del dopoguerra (1952-2017).Da un punto di vista metodologico, la ricerca si colloca al crocevia tra storia ambientale e storia dei consumi; inoltre, l'articolo fa riferimento ai gender studies per quanto concerne la condizione femminile nell'Italia del dopoguerra. The article investigates the emergence of sustainable practices in household consumption, with a view to analyzing when and how La Cucina Italiana, the best known Italian cooking magazine, promoted either challenged the spread of sustainable eating habits and, broadly speaking, the rise of conscious consumption patterns in post-war Italy (1952-2017). From a methodological point of view, the research lies at the crossroad between environmental history and consumption history; besides, the article owes to the so-called gender studies as refers to female condition in post-war Italy

Les politiques touristiques du fascisme et les relations internationales de l’Italie, entre diplomatie publique et création d’une marque de destination-Italie

L’article analyse le rôle des politiques touristiques fascistes en relation avec les activités de diplomatie publique et de création d’une marque de destination « Italie ». Ce secteur est particulièrement important pour consolider une image positive ou négative d’un pays dans l’opinion publique internationale. Après avoir présenté une synthèse des principaux éléments du système institutionnel touristique fasciste, la recherche se concentre sur le lien entre les relations internationales et le développement du tourisme, en soulignant les différences et similitudes entre les politiques touristiques menées dans les années vingt et dans les années trente. À cette époque, l’Italie est développée comme une image de marque, une opération de construction de la représentation de la nouvelle Italie fasciste mise en place au travers de la stratégie de communication publique du régime.This essay analyzes the place of tourism within the Italian fascist regime’s public diplomacy and national branding. The sector was especially important for consolidating a positive (or negative) image of the country on the international stage. After summarizing the main elements of the international system of fascist tourism, the paper addresses the link between international relations and the development of tourism, comparing the 1920s and the 1930s. The construction of a national brand during these years marked the representation of a new fascist Italy defined by the regime’s communication strategy