Framing the EU as Common Project vs. Common Heritage: Effects on Attitudes Towards the EU Deepening and Widening

The Effect of Verbal and Iconic Messages in the Promotion of High-Quality Mountain Cheese: A Non-Hypothetical BDM Approach

To ensure the sustainable development of mountain livestock farming, the adequate remuneration of high-quality dairy products is fundamental. In this sense, communication strategies aimed at promoting mountain products and ensure better positioning and higher market prices are fundamental. The present research seeks to expand the literature regarding consumers' willingness to pay for mountain foods by using an online real auction experiment aimed at evaluating the premium price that consumers are willing to pay for summer over winter mountain cheese, depending on the information provided concerning the taste anticipation or animal welfare. The results showed an overall small premium price given to the higher quality summer cheese; this could be, partially, due to a generally low degree of consumer knowledge about mountain dairy farming. With reference to communication strategies, the results provide evidence about the effectiveness of the rational messages founded upon sensorial characteristics and the anticipated taste of cheese. In addition, this study explored that adding a logo had no main effect on the price premium participants were willing to pay. This may be due to the fact that logos and claims, having a lower information content, are more indicated to lead the choice of consumers with a higher level of awareness. In the conclusion section, policy and agribusiness implications of the findings are provided.

Understanding Support for European Integration Across Generations: A Study Guided by the Theory of Planned Behavior

Recent events, such as failed constitutional referenda, low voting turnout in the European Union parliamentary elections, and the 2016 Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom call for a better understanding of people's voting behavior in relation to the EU. The current study is the first attempt to use the theory of planned behavior to explore the antecedents of voting for EU integration in an Italian convenience sample (N = 441) of varying age. A structural equation model of voting intentions showed an excellent fit to the data, both for the whole sample and for subsamples of young vs. old participants. Perceived behavioral control, mainly determined by participants' beliefs about the difficulties of exerting direct democratic control through citizenship and voting, had a significant effect on intentions to vote in favor of EU integration across age groups. In addition, older people's intentions were also affected by their attitude towards EU integration, based primarily on their beliefs about losing national identity.

Control Interactions in the Theory of Planned Behavior: Rethinking the Role of Subjective Norm

Research with the theory of planned behavior (TPB) has typically treated attitude (ATT), subjective norm (SN), and perceived behavioral control (PBC) as independent predictors of intention (INT). However, theoretically, PBC moderates the effects of ATT and SN on intention. In three studies dealing with different behaviors (voting, reducing household waste, and energy consumption) we show that greater PBC tends to strengthen the relative importance of ATT in the prediction of intention, whereas it tends to weaken the relative importance of SN. The latter pattern was observed in relation to injunctive as well as descriptive subjective norms, and it may help explain the relatively weak relation between SN and INT frequently observed in TPB studies.

Five Dimensions of European Identity: A Contribution to the Italian Adaptation and Validation of the In-Group Identification Scale

Recent approaches define collective identity as a multi-component construct. Nonetheless, there is a lack of research about the dimensionality of in-group identification in relation to European Identity. Leach and colleagues (2008) proposed a framework of in-group identification, in which they distinguish five main components integrated into two higher-order dimensions. In two studies we examined the validity of the Italian version of the In-Group Identification Scale by Leach et al., with a focus on European identity. Confirmatory factor analyses revealed that the hierarchical model of in-group identification fitted the data well (Study 1); the measure was shown to have satisfactory convergent and divergent validity. In Study 2, the relations between European identification and several possible antecedents and outcomes were examined.