A Model-Driven Approach for Crowdsourcing Search

Even though search systems are very ecient in retrieving world-wide information, they can not capture some peculiar aspects and features of user needs, such as subjective opin- ions and recommendations, or information that require local or domain specic expertise. In this kind of scenario, the hu- man opinion provided by an expert or knowledgeable user can be more useful than any factual information retrieved by a search engine. In this paper we propose a model-driven approach for the specication of crowd-search tasks, i.e. activities where real people { in real time { take part to the generalized search process that involve search engines. In particular we dene two models: the\Query TaskModel", representing the meta- model of the query that is submitted to the crowd and the associated answers; and the \User Interaction Model", which shows how the user can interact with the query model to fulll her needs. Our solution allows for a top-down design approach, from the crowd-search task design, down to the crowd answering system design. Our approach also grants automatic code generation thus leading to quick prototyping of search applications based on human responses collected over social networking or crowdsourcing platforms

Relation Liftings on Preorders and Posets

The category Rel(Set) of sets and relations can be described as a category of spans and as the Kleisli category for the powerset monad. A set-functor can be lifted to a functor on Rel(Set) iff it preserves weak pullbacks. We show that these results extend to the enriched setting, if we replace sets by posets or preorders. Preservation of weak pullbacks becomes preservation of exact lax squares. As an application we present Moss's coalgebraic over posets

Work-life interferences in the early academic career stages: The case of precarious researchers in Italy

This paper addresses the topic of work–life interferences in academic contexts. More specifically, it focuses on early career researchers in the Italian university system. The total availability required from those who work in the research sector is leading to significant transformations of the temporalities of work, especially among the new generation of researchers, whose condition is characterized by a higher degree of instability and uncertainty. Which are the experiences of the early career researchers in an academic context constituted by a growing competition for permanent positions and, as a consequence, by a greatly increased pressure? Which are the main gender differences? In what elements do Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics disciplines differ from Social Sciences and Humanities? The collected narratives reveal how the ongoing process of precarization is affecting both the everyday working activities and the private and family lives of early career researchers, with important consequences also on their future prospects

Precariousness and Gender Asymmetries Among Early Career Researchers: A Focus on STEM Fields in the Italian Academia

This article analyses how the growing instability and uncertainty in the Italian academic system intersect the mechanisms that reproduce gender disadvantages in scientific careers. More precisely, it focuses on how job instability influence career chances among male and female PhD holders at the very beginning of their career in STEM disciplines, paying attention to the mechanisms that foster the exclusion from the academic system. On the base of the results of the Doctorate Holders' Vocactional Integration survey, conducted by ISTAT in 2014, and of a qualitative organisational case study conducted in an Italian STEM department, working conditions and career strategies of male and female early stages researchers are explored adopting both an objective and a subjective perspective. The analyses point out that the current precarisation of scientific careers does not seem to scratch and/or undermine the organisational culture in the Italian universities, which relies on a traditional gender model