15th Symposium on the Contributions of Psychology to Peace Bridging Across Generations: Turning Research into Action for Children and Families, in collaborazione con UNICEF – Office of Research Innocenti, Associazione Italiana di Psicologia (AIP) e International Committee for the Psychological Study of Peace (CPSP). 21 – 27 Maggio 2017 Firenze e Roma

The theme of the 15th for Symposium on the Contributions of Psychology to Peace is Bridging Across Generations: Turning Research into Action for Children and Families. This multi-faceted theme captures the research topics and priorities not only of peace psychology, but also of the host country and its convening partner the world’s largest child rights organization, UNICEF. The symposium program will examine pressing research issues for children and families, but also look at how to leverage findings to make the most of them in programming, policy and advocacy and bring about change at all levels for children and their families. Present day Italy is faced with many interrelated challenges, which span across the study of psychological processes, intergenerational changes and international dynamics, and are pivotal to contemporary peace research. Individuals, families and institutions are increasingly more confronted by the need for constructing new forms of identity and co-existence as Italians, Europeans and Mediterraneans. The generation who lived through World War II is disappearing, leaving to families and institutions the duty of memory, but at the same time, young Italians are becoming more intercultural, espousing an unprecedented mix of values, origins and narratives. Finding itself in the middle of the European “refugee crisis”, Italy has also become one of the main landing places for children and families escaping from instability and extremism, arriving from across the southern shores of the Mediterranean Sea and the Middle East. Italy is facing new needs and fears, many of which are also present elsewhere in Europe and globally. The challenges are mirrored in the topics of research and intervention of local peace psychologists, who while also examining more traditional peace psychology topics such as dehumanization, victimization and intergroup contact, have a strong focus on studying intergenerational relationships, emerging citizenships, shared knowledge and family narratives, resilience and prosociality in families and children. The vision for this symposium is to turn the focus to children and adolescents, including and their parents and caregivers, and build a picture of the challenges and opportunities they face: from the local context to the diverse cultural and socio-political settings in which local and international researchers and practitioners, members of CPSP and UNICEF work. In true peace psychology spirit, the aim is also to go beyond exchanging interesting findings to turning research into outputs and actions that have the potential to positively impact on the lives of children, their families and communities.