TECHNO-SCIENTIFIC PRACTICES AND SOCIO-CULTURAL PROCESSES

The research activities of the Techno-scientific Practices and Socio-cultural Processes Area are interdisciplinary in nature and focus on the investigation of the relationships that arise between:

  • techno-scientific practices and the rest of social practices;
  • technological interventions in the territory and the populations that inhabit it;
  • the processes and results of scientific and technological research and their communication to broader segments of the population.

Investigations of these relationships are carried out through social research methods, both qualitative and quantitative. 

In particular, the Techno-scientific Research Practices and Socio-cultural Processes Area is interested in developing the controversy mapping approach for application to cases of interest to the Department.

The controversy mapping approach, developed in the area of Social Studies of Science and Technology (ERC area SH3_14), aims to detect, describe and visualize controversies that develop from technological or scientific issues, identifying positions, actors and dynamics. The results of this method-controversy maps-can be used to establish processes of participation in techno-scientific choices that impact an area or a given sector of the population.

The Techno-scientific Practices and Socio-cultural Processes Area carries out its research through close collaboration with:

  • Theseus - The Turin Polytechnic Institute's Center for Studies on the Relations between Technology, Society and Humanity;
  • FULL, the interdepartmental center for urban and territorial studies;
  • TdPLab (Design Theory Laboratory) of the Department of Architecture and Design;
  • ScienzaNuova, the inter-university school of higher studies dealing with the relationships between social-humanistic and engineering knowledge.

The activities of the Techno-scientific Practices and Socio-cultural Processes Area are primarily carried out in relation to the following research projects:   

  • Gendered Innovation Living Lab (GILL) (HORIZON);
  • Dialoguing Species - Designing Common Worlds through Ethnographies (DSooE) (PRIN-PNRR);
  • Teacher and school leaders training to promote Digital liteRacy and combat the spread ofdisinfOrmation among vulNerable groups of adolEscents (DRONE) (ERASMUS-EDU-2023-PI-FORWARD);
  • climate_transition@polito (ct_@polito) (Department of Excellence).