Research and projects
Research and projects
Publications
Relationships among sustainability dimensions: evidence from an Alpine area case study using Dominance-based Rough Set Approach with Paola Ferretti and Maria Bruna Zolin - Land Use Policy (2020).
European and Chinese Consumers' Attitude for Food with Reduced Use of Chemicals: Results from a Surve with Martina Mazzarolo, Maria Bruna Zolin and Ilda Mannino - Sustainable Development and Energy Transition in Europe and Asia, 9, 197-216 (2020).
Working Papers
The Impact of Social Capital on Vaccination Campaigns: Results from the French Case Study
I empirically study the effect of social capital on the success of the vaccination campaign in France during the Covid-19 epoque. I use data at department level. By performing a time-series analysis, I find that there is a positive relationship between the level of social capital and the vaccination success. The trend stops only after the enforcement of stricter public policies, like the introduction of the green pass.
Work in progress
The effect of polarised information on social preferences: an experimental approach.
Rising polarization endangers social cohesion, threatening the maintenance and growth of a healthy society. This study investigates the impact of exposure to polarized articles on social preferences, focusing on how such exposure influences altruism, cooperativeness, and anti-social behavior. The research explores three key channels — emotions, group identity, and expectations about the others — that may drive the deterioration of social preferences in a polarized news environment. I conduct an online experiment, wherein I have participants reading polarized articles and then interacting with other participants whose characteristics are not disclosed. I find that pro-attitudinal and counter-attitudinal articles impact the level of cooperation and altruism: reading pro-attitudinal articles increases cooperation and decreases anti-social behavior. Conversely, reading counter-attitudinal articles decreases altruism and increases anti-social behavior. The impact is asymmetrical among different political supporters, providing the first experimental evidence that polarized articles affect social preferences.
First Impressions Matter: The Lasting Impact of Slanted Media on Attitudes with Federico Innocenti and Marco Minozzo (Under review)
We investigate how slanted articles influence attitudes. We implemented a field experiment where university students were randomly assigned to different treatments, reading news articles with either a positive or negative slant on several topics over four weeks. We collected students’ attitudes weekly and in a follow-up survey four weeks later. We find that: a) slanted information significantly shifts attitudes in the intended direction; b) the effect is more substantial for novel topics; c) the first impression about a novel topic shapes attitudes; d) the change in attitudes persists over time; e) different attitudes drive different economic decisions. Our findings highlight that media are more effective when shaping initial attitudes rather than altering existing ones. Thus, our results show the importance of timely information provision, especially in the early stages of public discourse.
Discrimination on information provision: the case of Tiktok with Federico Innocenti and Tsung-Hsien Li
We study how the characteristics of information providers impact the news consumers’ perception of information quality. The characteristics of information providers are crucial in online news consumption because most information providers do not have a reputation, and interactions are primarily one-shot. We focus on the comparison between characteristics that can lead to statistical discrimination— education, for instance—and characteristics from which no inference about information quality should be possible—such as gender and ethnicity. We plan to bring the experiment to the field—on TikTok—and study whether potential discrimination based on information providers’ characteristics can impact the popularity of content and profiles on social media. The National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) of the Republic of China (Taiwan) has awarded us a research grant for this project. The experiment will be launched in 2025 and is expected to be finished in the spring of 2026.
Between Climate Culprit and Climate Solution: How German Media Portray Agriculture with Wilken Brunkhorst and Doris Läpple
The relationship between agriculture and climate change is complex. Agriculture contributes to climate change, is also heavily affected by its impact, but can also offer solutions for climate change mitigation. Media coverage influences how this multifaceted relationship is perceived by the public. This study explores how German media portray the relationship between agriculture and climate change, focusing on both the content and tone of reporting. Using a Large Language Model (LLM), we conduct a systematic content analysis of 185 articles from ten major German media outlets. We categorize media outlets as liberal, conservative, and specialist agricultural media, and analyze whether agriculture is depicted as a driver, a victim, or a solution to climate change. Our findings reveal significant variation in tone, thematic emphasis, and solution orientation depending on the political leaning and media type. Liberal media show a more critical stance but also emphasize structural solutions such as dietary change and livestock reduction. Conservative outlets predominantly portray agriculture as a victim of climate impacts, while specialist agricultural media have a mainly positive tone towards agriculture and a focus on adaptation. We also find that the general attitude toward agriculture and the thematic framing within the articles are correlated. Overall, our findings show that media coverage not only reflects but also constructs particular narratives about the relationship between agriculture and climate change. This highlights the need for communication strategies that address all key dimensions of the issue across audiences in ways that reduce polarization and foster climate-aware behavior.
Sentiment Evolution in the media: the case of international conflicts with Federico Innocenti and Paolo Italiani
We use textual analysis to evaluate newspapers’ behaviors over time. We consider all the written articles of a large set of Italian newspapers for the period (01.01.2015 to present) that present specific keywords (namely, Israel and Palestine) to evaluate how their sentiment change over time and differentiate among them with a specific focus on the conflict period. Therefore, the focus in on the supply side and how it varies in the presence of unexpected events. Lastly, we compare our findings with the predictions of an Hotelling model that is used as benchmark in media economics. We are currently collecting the articles. The code to implement the analysis is ready.