Training activities aimed at knowledge of European and international research systems
During the first year of the Ph.D. program, a specific activity is planned with the main objective of informing Ph.D. and Ph.D. students about the principles governing research management with a focus on European and international systems, reproducibility and open science in psychological research. Research in psychology has been among the most affected by the so-called replication crisis. This has led not only to a critical review of the methodologies already used, but also to the development of new tools for a more open and shared science. Ph.D. and Ph.D. students will be provided not only with a general overview of these issues, as well as proposed solutions, but will also be given the necessary tools to implement them within their own research projects.
Advanced language training activities
During the first year of the Ph.D. program, there is a specific activity aimed at enhancing knowledge of scientific English. With the aim of providing suggestions for enhancing the development of academic writing skills, activities are proposed that focus on writing an abstract and, more generally, an academic article in English, contextually analyzing the various sections that constitute it. To this end, the syntactic, lexical and grammatical structures most commonly occurring in academic writing in English will be examined. Specifically, Ph.D. and Ph.D. students will be asked to draft an abstract for submission to a conference or scholarly journal. In parallel, practical activities aimed at enhancing oral presentation skills are posed. Each doctoral student will be expected to briefly present his/her research project in English, following some guidelines proposed by the lecturer. In this regard, efforts will be made to stimulate conversation.
Computer enhancement activities
During the first year of the PhD program, a specific activity is planned with the main objective of consolidating the knowledge of basic computer tools, mainly Excel, SPSS and R Studio, useful in the field of data processing aimed at carrying out research in the field of psychology. Specifically, the course after an initial introduction regarding the units of analysis, the main indices of position and dispersion, will aim at the construction of a survey from the definition of the objectives and research design, to the processing, analysis and interpretation of data using R. The main objective is to provide skills that will give increasing autonomy to Ph.D. and Ph.D. students in producing research products for presentation at national and international conferences.