PRIN 2022 - DISTUM - Dipartimento di Studi Umanistici

Longitudinal assessment of multidomain reading-FREE neurocognitive markers for early detection of Developmental Dyslexia (FREE-DD)

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: The project aims to evaluate the diagnostic validity in early primary school years of a computer-based, Reading-Free Screening Tool (RFST) for Developmental Dyslexia (DD) and other reading difficulties, which we have recently developed. The project is conceived as a longitudinal study covering a range of behavioural, neuropsychological, and neuroimaging indices, to identify neurocognitive markers capable of detecting risks and signs of DD and other reading difficulties before they become clinically manifest, thus permitting more timely interventions in the early phases of the learning process. The focus on a reading-free assessment of the neurocognitive prerequisites of literacy is motivated by the necessity to have a screening tool that can be equally applied in young monolingual children and in minority language children (MLC) with diverse language origins. This is of fundamental importance, since DD may be initially confused with subtler reading difficulties that can generally resolve if promptly treated, as may be the case with MLC. We therefore need new screening tools that can effectively distinguish neurodevelopmental reading deficits, as in DD, from reading difficulties due to environmental and linguistic factors. These objectives will be achieved by the collaboration of three units. We will collect multiple cohorts of primary school children who will be longitudinally assessed by means of the RFST in grades 2 and 3, and will also undergo a standardised clinical evaluation of reading skills in grade 3 to discriminate typical from atypical readers. Unit 1 will sample 30 children with familial risk for DD, and collect additional behavioural and neuroimaging measures; Unit 2 will sample 100 children, either monolingual or MLC, and validate additional reading-free tasks; Unit 3 will sample 30 prematurely born children, collecting neuroimaging measures. Units 1 and 3 will also jointly collect 30 control children born at term and without familial risk for DD. These diverse populations cover a broad range of risks for reading difficulties, and reflect the added value of the project, aiming to elucidate the multifactorial nature of reading deficits along a neurodevelopmental continuum. Cohort-specific and pooled analyses of the multivariate longitudinal data will leverage semi-automatic methods able to classify typical versus atypical readers at grade 3, based on RFST indices and other neurobehavioural and neuroimaging measures at grade 2. We thus aim to identify a set of discriminant neurocognitive markers of DD and other reading disorders, hence providing evidence-based grounding for the predictive power of our RFST. Discriminant RFST tasks will be implemented in a web-app (based on preliminary work by Units 1 and 3), which will be released and tested during the project, aiming for a freely available tool that can support primary school teachers and clinicians in the early recognition of children at risk of developing reading difficulties.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 212.500

Importo totale UniUrb: € 91.120

Periodo: 05/10/2023 – 04/10/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof.ssa Manuela Berlingeri

Codice progetto: 2022TA92HS

CUP:H53D23004360001 

Sounding Complex. Morphological structure and lexical information in speech production, perception and comprehension (CompLeXSpeech)

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: Do phonetics and grammar see each other in language production and processing? This project asks whether words’ morphological function and lexical-statistical properties are systematically encoded in the way words are produced, perceived and comprehended. Recent research is showing that gradient phonetic detail can be used to encode paradigmatic contrasts and grammatical functions of words. However, only a reduced set of languages (English and a few others) and a limited number of phonological, morphological and lexical phenomena have been investigated so far. Italian is interesting because of its partly different morphological and phonological characteristics. Moreover, this project expands on existing research by addressing a variety of morphological and lexical variables and by integrating methodologies from different sub-disciplines: acoustic phonetics, articulatory phonetics, speech perception and comprehension, quantitative corpus analyses, and metalinguistic tasks to assess mophological awareness in speakers from varying sociolinguistic backgrounds. We analyse the phonetic correlates of morphological complexity and of some lexical-statistical properties of words. More specifically, we analyse the acoustics, articulation and perception of phonologically equivalent structures with different morphological status (for instance, dis- in It. discolpa ‘defence’ vs. discorso ‘discourse’) or different lexical-statistical properties (for instance, gemination in words with a minimal neighbor as in palla ‘ball’ - pala ‘shovel’ vs. words with no minimal neighbor as in zolla ‘clump’ - *zola). Using metalinguistic tasks in secondary schools and undergraduate university settings, we furthermore investigate whether the speakers rely on this kind of grammar-induced phonetic variation during the acquisition of the morphology and the lexicon of a language.The general hypothesis is that the speakers use phonetics to convey additional morphological and lexical meanings going beyond phonological meaning: they encode phonetically the morphological function of phonological structures, or enhance phonological contrasts that are paradigmatically more relevant in the language. Our investigation will therefore have an impact on current theories of morphology and morphological complexity, models of speech production and perception, modular views of grammar including the notion of interface between levels, and the teaching and learning of morphology and lexicon for speakers varying for language experience and educational/literacy level.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 157.250

Importo totale UniUrb: € 53.250

Periodo: 05/10/2023 – 04/10/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof.ssa Chiara Celata

Codice progetto: 20224RHTNL

CUP: H53D23004050001

FRAME - Framing Medievalisms: Historiography, Cultural Heritage, Media Communication and Languages in Italy (1980-2022)

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: The project aims to investigate the phenomenon of Medievalism in Italy from 1980, the watershed year of the publication of “The Name of the Rose,” to the present day. The aim is to identify in a systematic and multidisciplinary way the contribution of Italian research and culture to the construction of contemporary Medievalism in the West and the uses and ideologies hidden in the late twentieth-century process of global acculturation centered on the meta-historical and atemporal Middle Ages. While Medievalism is a growing and evolving cultural phenomenon, there is a lack of analytical and comprehensive studies acknowledging its different contributions (academic, cultural, social, multimedia) and evolutionary phases. The research aims to fill this gap to increase knowledge and awareness of the phenomenon in the Italian academy and society. The analysis will explore five fundamental themes, namely:

• Global Medievalism (Italian Medievalism in relation to international Medievalism); • Academic Medievalism (Medievalism in academic historiography through the investigation of the archives of historical institutes and the academic and popular bibliography); • Media Medievalism (Medievalism through the media, publishing, audiovisual, digital); • Public Medievalism (the interpretation of Medievalism in the territory by local realities in festivals, and reenactments); • Literary Medievalism (Medievalism in the work of authors such as Fabrizio De André, Umberto Eco, Dario Fo, Mario Luzi...).

The different Units, thanks also to their specific competencies and ongoing collaborations, contribute to the various themes in a complementary way: the Rome La Sapienza Unit will work on Global and Academic Medievalisms, the Urbino Unit on Public and Literary Medievalisms and the Bologna Unit on Media Medievalism. The project foresees the creation of a FRAME platform for sharing research, to be put in open access in order to make the contents of the database available for the public. An experimental WebApp will also be designed to disseminate research results on a significant case study. Traditional research outputs such as conferences, publications, podcasts and social content and other public engagement products are also planned.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 246.109

Importo totale UniUrb: € 63.307

Periodo: 28/09/2023 – 27/09/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof. Tommaso di Carpegna Gabrielli Falconieri

Codice progetto: 2022HMH5MJ

CUP: H53D23000220006

Learning math in prison: educational design in context of multi-complexity

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: Learning Math in Prison (LeMP) is an interventionist “educational design research” (McKenney & Reeves, 2018) project. Its aim is twofold, both theoretical and practical. LeMP responds to the needs expressed by mathematics teachers in prison to have adequate training and to have teaching materials suitable for the context in which they are working. Education is one of the main general problematic issues in prison, although the right to study is clearly present in the Italian Constitution (art. 34, art. 33 Cost.), in Universal Declaration of Human Rights (art. 26 UDHR) and it is also explicitly recognized by the Penitentiary Law (art. 15, art. 19 O.P.). Ministerial data describe a critical level of schooling among detained people in prison for adults in Italy. Among the subjects studied in prison, mathematics plays a particular role being both a form of personal enjoyment and a gatekeeper for future studies or job positions (Ahl & Helenius, 2021). Thus, the learning of mathematics appears particularly important, but there is a gap in research literature on this topic. Teachers in prison are crucial “agents of change” (Zizioli, 2014), able to introduce the student to new individual and relational knowledge. However, at the moment, there is no specific training for Italian teachers in prison. Specific skills are gained “on the field”, by direct experience, and mathematics teachers in prison schools express a need for professional development and dedicated teaching materials. A response to such needs requires theoretical elaboration since research about the teaching/learning of mathematics in prison is very scarce at the international level and almost nonexistent in Italy. First, descriptive research is needed to frame the specificity of the development of mathematical literacy within the context of Italian prisons. Then, design principles and didactical recommendations still need to be developed and tested on the field. Within LeMP, organized sets of mathematical tasks (to which we refer as learning units) are co-constructed by researchers and teachers (from at least three prison schools in different Italian regions) collaborating together. Researchers will inform teachers about possible solutions available in literature (e.g. Universal Design for Learning); teachers will contribute with their experience of teaching mathematics in the specific context of prisons. Along the process of design, the researchers will develop design principles (van den Akker, 1999) to be used for the production of further materials and for teachers training. Through the repetition of several cycles of context-analysis, design, and evaluation of products, the project will provide design principles for mathematics education in the prison context (as theoretical outcome) and examples of such principles in various learning units (as practical outcome). The outcomes will be collected in a book and presented to prison mathematics teachers during a dedicated workshop.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 199.422

Importo totale UniUrb: € 10.390

Periodo: 15/10/2023 – 14/10/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof. Enrico Angelo Emili

Codice progetto: 20223F9SRE

CUP: H53D23005570006 

Repertory of courts. Language, languages and cultural textuality [ReCoLLeCT]

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: The project aims to investigate the language, languages (intended as subcodes) and the textual culture of the courts through the investigation of four centres in central-northern Italy between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, chosen for their representativeness: the Florence of the Medici, the Urbino of the Montefeltro, the Rimini of the Malatesta, the Ferrara of the Este. The historical period examined (the Renaissance era, limited here from the beginning of the fifteenth century to the mid-sixteenth century) presents very considerable potential for investigating the fundamental characteristics of the textual production of the courts, as well as the official interactions between the various centers, in a moment salient in which the local linguistic manifestations, expression of the various territories, adapt to the process of searching for a unitary language and a grammatical norm. For each court, the web portal will include two sections: one aimed at documentary, diplomatic and bureaucratic texts; the other one at "domestic literature", in order to highlight the two lines of investigation and, where possible, the comparison between writers who they measure with both types. More generally, through the new documentary and literary acquisitions, the project aims to define a field of investigation useful for evaluating more precisely the osmosis relationship between the chancery "koinè" language and the court language of letters and "domestic" texts. Even this textual production is based, at least up to the definition of the sixteenth-century linguistic canon, on the various mix of local phono-morphological features, Latinisms and Tuscanisms. In addition, in relation to the documentary-cancelleresque corpus, particular attention will be paid to the theme of expository strategies, based on the setting of recent analyzes conducted on the series of the archive collection "Signori" in Archivio di Stato, Florence.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 188.162

Importo totale UniUrb: € 109.618

Periodo: 05/10/2023 – 04/10/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof. Andrea Felici

Codice progetto: 2022YMARNM

CUP: H53D23004420006

Populist landmarks between theory and history. "Hegemony" and "regimes of truth" as keys to determining the "epistemic relevance" of populisms

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: The aim of the project is the elaboration of a paradigm for the critical analysis of current populisms in Europe from the point of view of their “epistemic relevance”. By this we mean the way in which the presence of populisms redefines the overall framework of reference within the criteria of knowledge and not only of political cultures. The starting point of this research project is the current debate about post-truth, taken as a symptom of the crisis in the relationship between truth and politics, that is, of the social value and function of truth. We relate this crisis to the spread of populism in Europe, which is a phenomenon that has been widely studied, also in relation to the contestation of official “truth”. According to our approach, however, what “post-truth populisms” produce, and what requires further examination is a redefinition of the connection between truth and politics: in Foucauldian terms, a change in the “regime of truth” or, in Gramscian terms, a shift in “hegemony”. The approach in terms of “regime of truth” and “hegemony” is not theoretically homogeneous: therefore one of the aims of the project is to elaborate a paradigm that includes both in the concept of “epistemic relevance”. In this way we think we can avoid analyses of social movements in terms of “narratives” and “rhetorical” elaboration, because our analysis does not consider the sphere of “discourse” as independent but relates it to that of criteria of knowledge. We consider the current “populist moment” as the summary of a series of transformations that affect culture and theory. In order to be understood correctly in both its complexity and meaning, populism must be set against a historical background, so that it will be possible to investigate the not-always evident and coherent presence of its traces. In fact, our thesis states that the current crisis should be placed in a process of recurring cycles of crisis that characterised the entire 20th century. In the crisis that Europe and the Western World went through between the end of the 19th century and the first decades of the 20th, we identified the first great fracture between the social validity of truth and liberal-democratic politics, between the crisis of reason and the emergence of a new type of (corporative) politics. Two distinct but coordinated approaches will be used in the project: political and theoretical philosophy, and the history of philosophy and political thought. In this way it will be possible to combine the analysis of the current situation with that of the fin de siècle crisis and the emergence of the new politics. This coordination between research units, methods and fields of the research (articulated in 2 WP) will, on an organisational level, take the form of 1 conference and 2 inter-unit seminars, organised at different times by each of the two partners, to jointly deepen the research in the light of the general framework.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 176.936

Importo totale UniUrb: € 95.963

Periodo: 17/10/2023 – 16/10/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof. Fabio Frosini

Codice progetto: 2022MAAYRT

CUP: H53D23006990006

National survey on guidance in school. Research-training for the experimentation of a training orientation model and the development of an online community.

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: The research project has two main goals: 1. conduct a national survey with a representative sample on how Italian schools are applying the ministerial guidelines on guidance and collect knowledge on the methodologies and practices used in schools; 2. through a training research approach involving the various agencies of the education and training system, build and test RiFormOrienta, a guidance model developed within socio-constructivist theories and considering guidance as a set of actions based on training, information and counseling and aimed at enhancing self-responsibility and self-awareness in individuals who are building their personal, social and professional identity. Therefore, these actions are meant to promote cognitive, relational and social empowerment, self-regulation and self-efficacy skills, emotional balance, proactivity and resourcefulness, through the use of different approaches, as the narrative one, that foster full self-perception and the dynamic construction of one’s own identity. The RiFormOrienta model involves all kinds and levels of school and is based on the implementation of training modules for teachers and educational-didactic modules for students, within a network including also families and local agencies. The results of the national survey, the products derived from training research, didactic materials, protocols and best practices will all be transferred into an online open-access environment around which a community will be built. All the research units will be involved in the various phases of the national survey: from the creation of the questionnaire, differentiated by school level, to administering the questionnaires via CAWI, to data analysis. Furthermore, while producing and testing the RiFormOrienta module, each unit will play a complementary role with the other units: the University of Urbino will focus on actions addressed to pre-school and primary school; Roma Tre University on middle and secondary school and on CPIAs – Provincial Centers for Adult Education; the University of Trieste will concentrate on testing educational and guidance practices to students with SEN attending vocational schools; the University of Messina will use the Transactional Analysis model to plan and test educational and guidance practices to help middle school students to develop a school and professional project genuinely consistent with the peculiarities of their self; the University of Bari will design and implement an online environment for developing a community.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 167.800

Importo totale UniUrb: € 30.944

Periodo: 15/10/2023 – 14/10/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof. Roberto Travaglini

Codice progetto: 20223JY7NS

CUP: H53D23005590006

Clinical markers of linguistic and literacy vulnerabilities in adulthood: it’s never too late!

Breve descrizione, finalità e risultati attesi: This project aims primarily at evaluating the language and literacy difficulties (henceforth L&Ld) in adults with a vulnerability due to the lack of stimulation through the acoustic-phonological input (in the deaf population), the linguistic input (in minority language/bilingual speakers) or to the presence of a Specific Learning Disorders (henceforth SLD), attending Universities or vocational high schools. Secondly, the project intends to assess the effectiveness of a pedagogical intervention targeting the school context to identify educational practices able to foster the development of learning abilities by preventing the risk of dropouts and supporting academic achievements in vulnerable students. Therefore, the general purpose is to identify a set of discriminant markers of L&Lds in adulthood, employing a series of ecological and functional tasks to improve the understanding of these skills over and above compensatory strategies. To do so, we will use a range of tasks for the evaluation of linguistic comprehension and production, reading, spelling and written composition in adulthood, that will allow an examination of lexical, phonological, semantic and morphosyntactic skills in a population for which dedicated tests are not yet available in Italy. In this way, our research will offer an exhaustive evaluation of sources of difficulties among vulnerable populations, for which evidence is currently lacking. Additionally, these tasks will possibly serve as a starting point for creating a standardized battery of tests. In light of the results, we will further implement pedagogical practices of intervention targeting teachers to favour a better recovery of the areas of vulnerability in students and the best realization of their human capital within the school curriculum through the promotion of self-evaluation and self-monitoring strategies both in teachers and students. The three units will accomplish these aims by exploring different but complementary aspects of literacy: Unit 1 will focus on the reading of single words and sentences and lexical, semantic and morphosyntactic variables affecting decoding; Unit 2 will focus on syntactic production and comprehension as well as on phonological and syntactic processing; Unit 3 will focus on spelling and written composition abilities, with the exam of psycholinguistics characteristics of the written compositions. Additionally, Unit 2 will implement and test the efficacy of pedagogic interventions aiming at training teachers to acquire best practices. As a result, we will conceive a series of best practices that could be proposed as guidelines for evaluating and auto-evaluation of areas of risk within the school curriculum by teachers and students.

Importo totale del finanziamento: € 204.971

Importo totale UniUrb: € 66.535

Periodo: 05/10/2023 – 04/10/2025

Struttura UniUrb di riferimento: Dipartimento Studi Umanistici (DISTUM)

Referente UniUrb: Prof.ssa Mirta Vernice

Codice progetto: 20229PSYEP

CUP: H53D23004170006