1,721,164 research outputs found
Rally ‘round the flag effects are not for all : Trajectories of institutional trust among populist and non-populist voters
Full text linkUsing the Consequences of COVID-19 (COCO) dataset (quota sample of the adult Italian population, surveyed seven times by email), we analysed the trend of trust in political (political parties, parliament and local administrations), super partes (president of the Republic, judiciary and police) and international (the European Union and the United Nations) institutions from June 2019 to October 2022. Three latent growth curve models showed that trust in political institutions increased between June 2019 and April 2020 and subsequently decreased below the pre-pandemic level. Trust in super partes institutions decreased slightly between June 2019 and April 2020, decreased from April 2020 to April 2022 and increased in the subsequent months. Trust in international institutions declined between June 2019 and April 2020 and then returned to pre-pandemic levels. Three piecewise decompositions showed different trends in trust for non-populist voters, populist voters and non-voters. Strengths, weaknesses and possible developments of the study are discussed
Living in a Non-Communist Versus in a Post-Communist European Country Moderates the Relation Between Conservative Values and Political Orientation: A Multilevel Study
No full textLeft and right in the age of populism : has the populist zeitgeist permeated citizens’ representation of ideological labels?
Full text linkThis article explores whether the current populist zeitgeist has changed the social representation of the political labels ‘left’ and ‘right’ in terms of their relevance, understanding and meaning. We merged two post-electoral quota samples of the Italian adult population. The first (N = 1,377) was collected in 2006 by the ITANES research group, the second in 2019 (N = 1,504) for this study. We analysed the relevance of left and right in politics as the frequency with which participants placed themselves on the left–right axis; its understanding as the frequency with which participants answered at least one of two open-ended questions about the meaning of such categories, and the meaning participants gave to left and right in politics through content analysis of their responses to the open-ended questions above. From 2006 to 2019, the relevance and understanding of left and right declined. In terms of meanings, references to the traditional elements of left and right became less common, while references to specific leaders, and the notion of ‘left’ and ‘right’ in politics no longer making sense, became more widespread; moreover, none of the other populist categories significantly changed their frequency. This study expands the scope of the previous research on this topic also by identifying the critical role that political interest plays in the changes on which we have focused. Strengths, limitations and implications of the study are discussed
What buffers right-wing authoritarian responses to threat? An experimental study to test the moderation of meaning
Full text linkThe literature shows that exposure to societal threat stemming from criminality can elicit an increase in
right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) via the mediation of the loss of perceived control. In this study, we
investigated whether the perception of meaning can act as a buffering factor for such process, performing
an experiment with 316 Italian university students (67.8% women; mean age = 25.81, SD
= 9.18). A moderated mediation model showed that the loss of perceived control mediated the relation between societal threat stemming from criminality and RWA, but that the second link was significant only among people low in meaning. Limitations, implications and possible developments of this research are discussed
This Is Not the End : How the Appeal of Populism Changed Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic
Full text linkWhen the COVID-19 pandemic engulfed the world, the contextual conditions in which the rise of populism took place deeply and rapidly changed. Did this mark a turning point in the trend of populism? In this chapter, we attempt to answer this question mainly based on a longitudinal research program we undertook soon after the pandemic onset (taking advantage of a pre-pandemic wave) to monitor Italian public opinion longitudinally. The pandemic triggered a widespread sense of vulnerability and psychological distress, followed by the need to regain control over one’s life. We documented two ways in which Italians have coped with this and that are linked to the populist trend. On the one hand, citizens relied on institutional authorities involved in crisis management (the typical “rally effect”), and, on the other hand, we observed an enhanced desire for strong leaders who can individuate solutions and effectively enact quick actions. In relation to these trends, our research program documented that the pandemic led to a break in the rise of populist votes in Italy. However, populist orientations remained unchanged. Thus, it is plausible that populism had a temporary halt, but it is likely to rebound to higher levels when the health and economic situations will return to pre-pandemic levels
Basic Personal Values, the Country’s Crime Rate and the Fear of Crime
Full text linkThe main aim of this study was to investigate the relations between basic personal values, drawn on Schwartz's value theory, and the expression of the individual fear of crime by analysing the moderating role of contextual cues (i.e., crime rates). We performed a multinational, multilevel study using the 2008 European Social Survey dataset (N = 53,692, nested in 27 European countries). The fear of crime, which is a generalised insecurity about personal safety, showed a positive association with conservation (i.e., tradition, conformity and security) and a negative association with openness to change (i.e., hedonism, stimulation and self-direction) and self-transcendence values (i.e., benevolence and universalism). With the exception of self-transcendence, all the associations between basic values and the fear of crime were amplified by the country's crime rate: the higher the crime rate, the stronger the relation between values and the fear of crime. The implications and limitations of these results and possible further research directions are discussed.</p
Part-Time Farmers and Accidents with Agricultural Machinery: A Moderated Mediated Model on the Role Played by Frequency of Use and Unsafe Beliefs
No full textObjectives: We aimed at testing a model of the direct and indirect effects of being a part-time farmer on the probability of being involved in an agricultural machinery-related accident, considering the role played by unsafe beliefs and the frequency of use of machinery. Methods: Two-hundred and fifty-two Italian men, regular users of agricultural machinery (age: Mean = 45.1 years, standard Deviation = 17.5), were administered a paper-and-pencil questionnaire addressing their relation with work, unsafe beliefs, and previous experience of machinery-related accidents. Results: Being a part-time farmer showed a positive association with unsafe beliefs only among occasional machinery users. Unsafe beliefs in turn showed a positive association with accidents. Conclusions: The study gave a novel contribution to the knowledge of the chain of events connecting part-time farmers with machinery-related accidents. Preventive training interventions targeting part-timer farmers using agricultural machinery just occasionally should be developed
Multiple sources of adolescents' conservative values: A multilevel study
Full text linkIn a sample of 677 adolescents, extracted from 39 classes in 15 different high schools in Trento, Italy, a multilevel analysis was performed to analyze the relations between adolescents' conservative values, their perceptions of the conservative values their mothers would like to transmit to them (i.e., maternal socialization values) and the conservative values prevalent in their class context (i.e., classmates' and teachers' values). Perceived mothers' conservative values positively predicted adolescents' conservatism, while the mean class conservatism and teachers' conservatism did not. Also the cross-level interaction between mothers' and classmates' conservative values significantly predicted adolescents' conservative values. In particular, the relation between perceived mothers' conservatism and children's conservatism was stronger when adolescents perceived an alignment between their classmates' conservative values and their mothers' expectations of those values. Conversely, the interaction between mothers' and teachers' conservatism did not predict the criterion variable. Implications of this research and its possible developments are discusse
Intention to Adopt Digital Games for Safety Training in Young Farm Operators: The Role of Ease of Use, Perceived Usefulness, and Game Design Characteristics
No full textThe development of digital games has proven particularly fruitful for the introduction of new forms of occupational safety training in various work sectors, but less is known about their use in sectors as hazardous as agriculture. In this study, we used a path model to analyze the triggers for the intention to use digital games as a safety training method in a group of young agricultural operators. A questionnaire was used to investigate participants' intention to use games as safety training tools, perception of usefulness, perception of specific game design characteristics, and perceived ease of use. Game design characteristics and perceived ease of use were positively associated with perceived usefulness, which, in turn, was positively related to the intention to use digital games. These results provided some insights into the most critical variables that can be influenced to increase young farmers' intention to use digital games for effective safety training
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