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Social Capital refers to the resources associated with durable and trustworthy social connections. Social Capital can be developed through offline and online relationships. It can be distinguished between cognitive Social Capital (perception of trustworthiness, reciprocity, and support) and structural Social Capital (density of social networks and membership, and participation in groups and associations). It can also be distinguished between bonding Social Capital (resources associated with informal networks; i.e., neighbors, friends, colleagues) and bridging Social Capital (resources associated with formal networks; i.e., community service, cultural, religious or political groups/associations). The different forms and dimensions of Social Capital may have distinct effects on health outcomes and self-rated health. Therefore, public health researchers need valid and reliable instruments to investigate Social Capital. However, valid instruments including the measurement of online Social Capital are not available. The Personal Social Capital Scale aims to assess bonding and bridging Social Capital by means of cognitive and structural items. In the present investigation, three studies were carried out ( N = 1149) to adapt the Personal Social Capital Scale to develop the Personal On-Offline Social Capital Brief Scale, a brief scale for measuring online and offline bonding and bridging Social Capital in Italy. Factorial structure and convergent/divergent validity in relation to scales measuring constructs with different patterns of relationships with bonding and bridging Social Capital (i.e., social support and stress; sense of community and health) were also investigated. Overall, these studies provide evidence of reliability and validity related to the internal structure of the Personal On-Offline Social Capital Brief Scale in measuring online and offline bonding and bridging Social Capital and discriminating them from similar constructs. This scale is a useful instrument for planning public health interventions.

Performing a task with another person may either enhance or reduce the interference produced by task-irrelevant information. In three experiments, we employed the joint version of a Stroop-like task (i.e., the picture–word interference—PWI—task) to investigate some of the task features that seem to be critical in determining the effect of task-irrelevant information when the task is shared between two individuals. Participants were asked to perform a PWI task, which required to name a picture while ignoring a distractor word, first individually (in a baseline block of trials) and then co-acting with an alleged partner. Results showed that, compared to the baseline and to a condition in which participants continued to perform the PWI task individually, the belief of co-acting with another individual who was thought to be in charge of the distractor words suppressed the semantic interference effect when these words were in case alternation letters (e.g., “mOuSe”). Conversely, the semantic interference effect persisted when the co-actor was thought to be in charge of the same task as the participant, that is, the co-actor was thought to respond to the pictures. These results are accounted for by assuming that, when the participant knows that another person is in charge of the task-irrelevant information, a division-of-labour between participant and co-actor can be established. Such a division-of-labour may provide the participant with a strategy to oppose the semantic interference effect. Our findings, therefore, suggest that sharing a task with another person in charge of potentially interfering information can enable people to filter out this information from their own task representation.

When asked to reproduce abstract figures from memory, people with brain damage may draw meaningful figures or add extra features unrelated to the original stimulus. Such a phenomenon has been classified as an uncommon type of confabulation. However, this interpretation is unsatisfactory. The aim of this study was to revisit this phenomenon to provide a more robust interpretation. The records of 496 people presenting with cognitive complaints have been reviewed. Their copy and their reproduction by memory of the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure were analysed. Sixteen people presented with clear instances of the phenomenon. Although differences in cognitive profiles, including memory and executive functions, were detected in this group compared to the rest of the sample who did not present with the phenomenon, considering this phenomenon as a confabulation is misleading. We suggest that the compulsion to semantically process the meaningless figure as a meaningful object leads to the production of Graphic Transmutation . The meaningful object overrides the original due to a failure of monitoring functions associated to a defective visuo-spatial memory. Identifying Graphic Transmutation in neuropsychological evaluations may provide valuable insight into the cognitive profile of people with brain damage.

A survey in the United States revealed that an alarmingly large percentage of university psychologists admitted having used questionable research practices that can contaminate the research literature with false positive and biased findings. We conducted a replication of this study among Italian research psychologists to investigate whether these findings generalize to other countries. All the original materials were translated into Italian, and members of the Italian Association of Psychology were invited to participate via an online survey. The percentages of Italian psychologists who admitted to having used ten questionable research practices were similar to the results obtained in the United States although there were small but significant differences in self-admission rates for some QRPs. Nearly all researchers (88%) admitted using at least one of the practices, and researchers generally considered a practice possibly defensible if they admitted using it, but Italian researchers were much less likely than US researchers to consider a practice defensible. Participants' estimates of the percentage of researchers who have used these practices were greater than the self-admission rates, and participants estimated that researchers would be unlikely to admit it. In written responses, participants argued that some of these practices are not questionable and they have used some practices because reviewers and journals demand it. The similarity of results obtained in the United States, this study, and a related study conducted in Germany suggest that adoption of these practices is an international phenomenon and is likely due to systemic features of the international research and publication processes.

Surface dyslexia designates a selective impairment in reading irregular words, with spared ability to read regular and novel words, following a cerebral damage usually located in the left dominant hemisphere. In Italian language, which is regular at the segmental level, surface dyslexia is characterized by stress assignment errors. Here we report on two cases of Italian surface dyslexic patients who produced stress assignment errors, mainly in reading irregular words. In reading nonwords they usually applied the regular stress pattern. Both patients were also impaired in lexical decision and in semantic discrimination tasks when the processing of homophones was required. Our patients’ performance relied almost exclusively on the phonological coding of the stimulus, revealing a deficit in accessing the orthographical input lexicon. In addition, one patient showed a cerebral lesion limited to the right thalamus, providing evidence of a possible role of the right hemisphere in the reading process.

We investigated which item subsets of the Vineland-II can discriminate low-functioning preschoolers with ASD from matched peers with other neurodevelopmental disorders, using a regression analysis derived from a normative sample to account for cognitive and linguistic competencies. At variance with the typical profile, a pattern with Communication more impaired than Socialization was observed. The source of the frequently reported Socialization delay in ASD appears to be in Playing and Imitating skills only, not in other social adaptive behavior skills. The combination of item subsets Playing, Following instructions, Beginning to talk, and Speech skills provided the best discrimination between the two clinical groups. Evaluation of the Vineland-II score on item content categories is a useful procedure for a more efficient clinical description.

The present study investigated the effects of the first COVID-19 lockdown on the Cultural and Social Capitals in Italy in a large group of adults (n = 1125). The relationships between the COVID-19 spread and participants’ Cultural Capital, Social Capital, educational level, occupational prestige, and age were studied using structural equation models. For women but not for men, pandemic spread was positively affected by occupational prestige and it had a positive relationship with their Social Capital (women: CFI = 0.949; RMSEA = 0.059 [CI = 0.045-0.075]; men: CFI = 0.959; RMSEA = 0.064 [CI = 0.039–0.087]). Moreover, the participants were divided into three validated clusters based on their Cultural and Social Capitals levels to investigate changes in the Capitals compared with the pre-lockdown period. It was found that the lockdown contributed to improving the gap among individuals increasing high levels and decreasing low levels of both the Capitals. People with high Cultural and Social Capitals seemed to have seized the opportunity given by COVID-19 restrictions to cultivate their cultural interests and become more involved within their networks. In contrast, individuals with low Cultural and Social Capitals paid the highest price for the social isolation. Given that the Capitals encourage healthy behavior and influence well-being and mental health, institutions should develop or improve their policies and practices to foster individual resources, and make fairer opportunities available during the pandemic.

The present study aimed to assess whether the representation of the typical size of objects can interact with response position codes in two-choice bimanual tasks, and give rise to a SNARC-like effect (faster responses when the representation of the typical size of the object to which the target stimulus refers corresponds to response side). Participants performed either a magnitude comparison task (in which they were required to judge whether the target was smaller or larger than a reference stimulus; Experiment 1) or a semantic decision task (in which they had to classify the target as belonging to either the category of living or non-living entities; Experiment 2). Target stimuli were pictures or written words referring to either typically large and small animals or inanimate objects. In both tasks, participants responded by pressing a left- or right-side button. Results showed that, regardless of the to-be-performed task (magnitude comparison or semantic decision) and stimulus format (picture or word), left responses were faster when the target represented typically small-sized entities, whereas right responses were faster for typically large-sized entities. These results provide evidence that the information about the typical size of objects is activated even if it is not requested by the task, and are consistent with the idea that objects’ typical size is automatically spatially coded, as has been proposed to occur for number magnitudes. In this representation, small objects would be on the left and large objects would be on the right. Alternative interpretations of these results are also discussed.

Sociocultural level (SCL) comprises Socioeconomic Status (SES), Cultural Capital (CC), and Social Capital (SC). The relationships between all SCL dimensions have never been investigated. This study aimed to develop a structural equation model representing how age affects the relationships between educational level, occupational prestige (as a measure of SES), CC, and SC for men and women. SES, dimensions of CC and SC were measured with valid scales for 654 adults (63% female) aged 19 to 74 years ( M[SD] = 42.86 [13.32]), that had or used to have an occupation and the majority of whom had at least a university degree (65%). All lived in a medium-sized town in Italy. Age affected the interrelated indicators of SES (educational level and occupational prestige), which in turn affected the interrelated dimensions CC and SC (CFI = .97; RMSEA = .073 [CI = .053 - .095]; SRMR = 0.031). The system of relationships was simpler in men than in women, with educational level being less relevant in affecting the other constructs. The hierarchical structure of SCL and effect of age and gender must be properly taken into account in studies on the effects of SCL on human behavior.