Pensions,Growth and Concern about the Young

Within an overlapping generations framework, we show that the proportion of old age consumption financed by a pay-as-you-go system can be neutral with respect to the growth path of the economy in the presence of intergenerational transfers implemented by altruistic households or by a fiscal authority. The crucial impact on growth of society's propensity to favour the elderly is discussed. Furthermore, we offer an explanation for the existence of an authority redistributing income among generations when households are selfish. This concerns the fact that it is impossible for young agents to precommit themselves not to ask for some redistribution in their favour when old.     

The Internetization of International Migration

The Internet has revolutionized our economies, societies, and everyday lives. Many social phenomena are no longer the same as they were in the pre‐Internet era: they have been “Internetized.” We define the Internetization of international migration, and we investigate it by exploring the links between the Internet and migration outcomes all along the migration path, from migration intentions to actual migration. Our analyses leverage a number of sources, both at the micro‐ and the macro‐level, including the Gallup World Poll, the Arab Barometer, data from the International Telecommunication Union, the Italian population register, and unique register data from a migrant reception center in Southern Italy. We also distinguish between economic migrants—those who leave their country of origin with the aim of seeking better economic opportunities elsewhere—and political migrants—those who are forced to leave their countries of origin for political or conflict‐related reasons. Our findings point to a consistently positive relationship between the diffusion of the Internet, migration intentions, and migration behaviors, supporting the idea that the Internet is not necessarily a driving force of migration per se, but rather an enabling “supportive agent.” These associations are particularly relevant for economic migrants, at least for migration intentions. Further analyses underscore the importance of the Internet in providing a key informational channel which helps to define clearer migration trajectories.     

Optimal scale in the Italian gas distribution industry using data envelopment analysis

The Italian gas distribution industry presents a high degree of fragmentation. However, the tendency between 1970 and 1998 was a concentration process. Available evidence supports the thesis that local distributors have undertaken a process of scale enlargement. This raises the question of characteristics of returns to scale for such operators as well as the optimal scale at which they should operate. Returns to scale are analysed by data envelopment analysis (DEA) methodology. The results show that the output space in which DMUs attain a high level of scale efficiency is widespread, thus indicating an unexpected return to scale characterisation. Technology shows increasing returns only for the smallest units, but such an effect is rapidly exhausted in favour of a regime of constant returns to scale. The main managerial conclusion is that an improvement of productivity may be reached via an intensification of the merging process involving local distributors operating at a small scale. Moreover, the concentration process appears as an “attainable” objective since the critical dimension, which permits the exploitation of positive returns to scale, is quite small.     

Factor Structure and Psychometric Properties of the Italian Version of the Homosexuality Scale of the Trueblood Sexual Attitudes Questionnaire

The aim of the present study was to translate the Homosexuality scale of the Trueblood Sexual Attitudes Questionnaire into the Italian language and to assess its factor structure and psychometric properties in Italian psychology students. The questionnaire was originally developed and validated in U.S. college students, and later in Turkish social work students, showing high internal consistency. It measures attitudes toward several sexual practices and behaviors, regarding self and others. Particularly, the Homosexuality scale measures attitudes toward different sexual and romantic practices with people of the same sex. A total of 199 Italian psychology students participated to the study, and they were administered the Italian translation of the scale. We applied exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis. Results showed that the scale has high internal consistency, and that the original two-factor model accounting for attitudes toward self and others fits the data well. Implications for education and assessment in student populations are discussed.     

Ranking and Prioritization of Emergency Departments Based on Multi-indicator Systems

In this work we discuss how Emergency Departments (EDs) can be ranked on the basis of multiple indicators. This problem is of absolute relevance due to the increasing importance of EDs in regional healthcare systems and it is also complex as the number of indicators that have been proposed in the literature to measure ED performance is very high. Current literature faces this problem using synthetic (or numerically aggregated) indicators of a set of performance measures but, although simple, this solution has a number of drawbacks that make this choice inefficient: a compensation effect among the indicators; a high degree of subjectivism in the indicators weighting; opacity in the decision making; all the EDs are considered to be comparable. Indeed, the situations in which EDs are comparable (i.e. when all the performance of one ED are not lower than the performance indicators of the other) are a minority and incomparability is by itself a source of information that should be used to identify situations for which different policy actions should be designed. In this work we propose to use non compensatory composite indicators and partial ordering theory to rank and compare EDs giving value to the reasons of such an incomparability. These methods are applied on a case study of 19 EDs in an administrative region in Italy.     

The Differential Impact of the COVID-19 Crisis on Small-Scale Development Initiatives,a Cross-Country Comparison

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - The COVID-19 pandemic presents Northern-based development organisations with unprecedented difficulties. They are...     

Theory of mind and peer relationships: The role of social anxiety

Recent research has shown that individual differences in theory of mind (ToM) during middle childhood are linked with individual differences in children's peer relationships. The present longitudinal study investigated this association more deeply, exploring the potential mediating role played by children's social anxiety. We tested a group of 66 children (11.5 years old at Time 1) three times over one year after their transition to secondary school. Over and above language, SES and stability in individual differences, ToM performance shortly after starting secondary school (Time 1) predicted higher peer acceptance, as well as lower peer rejection, one year later (Time 3) via lower levels of social anxiety over time (Time 2). This study extends our knowledge about the links between social understanding and interpersonal relations in middle childhood. The results suggest that ToM may play an important role in children's adjustment when confronting new social contexts.     

Knowledge,Risk Perceptions,and Xenophobic Attitudes: Evidence from Italy During the Ebola Outbreak

The purposes of the current study were twofold: (1) to investigate affective and cognitive responses and social‐contextual factors related to Ebola and their intercorrelations in a developed country without widespread Ebola transmission; and (2) to examine the relationships among risk perception of Ebola, levels of knowledge about Ebola, and (blatant and subtle) prejudice toward African immigrants. Between January 2015 and March 2015, an anonymous cross‐sectional survey was conducted among a convenience sample of 486 Italian adults. Results showed that most participants were not particularly concerned about Ebola and did not feel at risk of acquiring the virus. Cognitive dimensions of risk perception of Ebola (i.e., perceived severity of illness, perceived personal impact, perceived coping efficacy, and likelihood of infection), affective response (or worry) to Ebola, and social‐contextual factors (i.e., perceived preparedness of institutions, family members’ and friends’ levels of worry) were interrelated. Prejudice toward African immigrants was positively related to risk perception of Ebola and negatively related to levels of knowledge about Ebola even when controlling for sociodemographic variables including political preference.     

Social comparison and risk taking behavior

This paper studies the effects of social comparison on risk taking behavior. In our theoretical framework, decision makers evaluate the consequences of their choices relative to both their own and their peers’ conditions. We test experimentally whether the position in the social ranking affects risk attitudes. Subjects interact in a simulated workplace environment where they perform a work task, receive possibly different wages, and then undertake a risky decision that may produce an extra gain. We find that social comparison matters for risk attitudes. Subjects are more risk averse in the presence of small social gain than social loss. In addition, risk aversion is decreasing in the size of the social gain.