Resilient grandparents in times of a pandemic: living in partnership|Nonni resilienti in tempo di pandemia: vivere in cordata!

The problem under consideration. This contribution refers to the studies conducted by the Generational Encounters Laboratory and by the A.R.I.P.T.Fo.R.P. more recently in the perspectives of social psychology and aging to address the problem of the pandemic as rift generated in the time axis. The social representations and practices of the elderly regarding an evolving society - between past, present and future - are analyzed by reading the results in the light of the reference theories (Mead, 1934; Moscovici, 1961/1976; Markus, 1977) and in an intergenerational perspective.Participants. In this first phase of the survey, 56 semi-structured interviews were collected for residents in some contexts in Northern Italy (38 in the cities of Milan, Bergamo, Brescia and Lecco) and in the Center (18 in the cities of Arezzo, Viterbo, Rome).Objective. The objective of the exploratory research is to reconstruct the experiences, emotions, attitudes - in synthesis the social representations (Moscovici, 1961/1976, 1984, 1988, 2000, 2001) and the practices of the over 65 before, during and after the pandemic in different Italian territorial contexts.Method. The interview is the tool that was selected with the aim of reconstructing the representations and social practices of the participants. The semi-structured interview outline was built ad hoc for research and is divided into three sections concerning the social representations and practices of the elderly before, during and after the Coronavirus. The analyzes were conducted using the IRAMUTEQ software for Descending Hierarchical Analysis (Camargo and Justo, 2013).Main results. Despite the numerous difficulties deriving from the pandemic, the results of the research highlight the presence of positive social representations that include the example of the parents and grandparents of the interviewees, responsible and strong in facing the difficulties and hardships that characterized the reconstruction after World War II. The memory of the resilient elderly (past self of society - Mead, 1934; Markus, 1977 enriches the cognitive and emotional baggage of those farsighted young people (present self) who will accept the challenge of "living in cordata"! This is the metaphor that, in the light of the Theory of Social Representations, helps to anchor and objectify the pact between generations" - deriving from the wisdom of grandparents - suitable for building a rich and consolidated future self of society.Conclusions and future perspectives. Studying how the elderly represent cognitively and how they emotionally deal with the particular historical moment has been relevant in an intergenerational psycho-social perspective. The strength of the research is precisely this point of view. The interest in the results obtained suggests expanding the collection of data, also improving the research methodology to promote representativeness. Applications. The research could also catch the attention of a wider audience in addition to the academic one, encouraging the opening of spaces for reflection on the importance of intergenerational social connections. The proposal that derives directly from the research results is that of the activation of intergenerational social laboratories (on the model of the one already active in Viterbo) in which the different generations can confront, structuring a dialogue in favor of the pact between generations.