SARS-CoV-2 and Companion Animals: Sources of Information and Communication Campaign during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Italy.

This study analyzed data on the sources and the level of Italians' awareness on the risk of infection by SARS-CoV-2 at the human-animal interface. Data were collected through a survey-type investigation on a representative sample of the Italian population. Forty-five percent of the interviewees were aware that companion animals could be infected by SARS-CoV-2. However, 29.8% were familiar with preventive measures to adopt to avoid viral transmission between infected humans and companion animals, and only 20.7% knew which companion animals could be at risk of infection. Higher awareness regarding the risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission between animals and humans (51.7%) and the measures to prevent it (33.3%) was detected among companion animals' owners. Notably, 40.4% of interviewees were not informed at all. Television broadcasts (26.4%) represented the main source of information, while only 3.5% of the interviewees relied on veterinarians, of which 31.9% considered this source of information as the most trustworthy. Overall, 72.4% of Italians recognized that the communication campaign on COVID-19 and companion animals was inadequate. This survey highlights the need for increasing the public awareness of the risk of companion animals being infected with SARS-CoV-2 and the involvement of professionals in the public communication on zoonoses.

Public Perception of COVID-19 Vaccination in Italy: The Role of Trust and Experts' Communication.

Objectives: Vaccination campaigns against COVID-19 throughout the world are not only a major organisational challenge, but also a communication and social challenge. Recent data from several countries show that a relevant proportion of citizens either do not plan to be vaccinated against COVID-19 or would rather postpone their vaccination. We argue that such attitudes are not the result of generalised scepticism about vaccination, nor of generalised distrust in science. Methods: We analysed data from three survey waves on attitudes to vaccination against COVID-19 conducted in Italy in October 2020, January 2021, and May 2021 in the context of the Science in Society Monitor. Results: Positive evaluations of experts' communication and trust in their contribution-as well as in that of health institutions, local authorities, and healthcare workers-play a key role in understanding the willingness to be vaccinated. Conclusion: Relevant implications can be drawn in terms of communication efforts and institutional strategies that are essential to build effective and inclusive vaccination campaigns.

Correction: Public communication by research institutes compared across countries and sciences: Building capacity for engagement or competing for visibility?

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0235191.].

Public communication by research institutes compared across countries and sciences: Building capacity for engagement or competing for visibility?

Leading academic institutions, governments, and funders of research across the world have spent the last few decades fretting publicly about the need for scientists and research organisations to engage more widely with the public and be open about their research. While a global literature asserts that public communication has changed from a virtue to a duty for scientists in many countries and disciplines, our knowledge about what research institutions are doing and what factors drive their 'going public' is very limited. Here we present the first cross-national study of N = 2,030 research institutes within universities and large scientific organisations in Brazil, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America. We find that institutes embrace communication with non-peers and do so through a variety of public events and traditional news media-less so through new media channels-and we find variation across countries and sciences, yet these are less evident than we expected. Country and disciplinary cultures contribute to the level of this communication, as do the resources that institutes make available for the effort; institutes with professionalised staff show higher activity online. Future research should examine whether a real change in the organisational culture is happening or whether this activity and resource allocation is merely a means to increase institutional visibility.

Midsagittal cranial shape variation in the genus Homo by geometric morphometrics.

Midsagittal profiles of crania referred to different taxa of the genus Homo have been analyzed by geometric morphometric techniques. Comparisons between single specimens using the thin-plate-spline function suggest a generalized reduction of the lower face, associated with antero-posterior development of the braincase occurring (possibly in parallel evolution) along distinct human lineages. Furthermore, Neandertals display a projection of the midface, and modern humans show a derived globularity of the vault associated with midsagittal parietal bulging. Principal Component Analysis demonstrates a bimodal pattern of variation, which describes an "archaic" pole (rather heterogeneous in terms of taxonomy) clearly distinguishable from the modern one. The first two principal components - that explain together 80% of the total variance in shape - involve respectively fronto-parietal expansion and midfacial prognathism. These results contribute to identify different structural patterns in human evolution, supporting discontinuity rather than continuity of cranial shape among different taxa of the genus Homo, especially when considering the differences between Neandertals and early modern humans.