We are pleased to announce the creation of an MSCA Doctoral Network funded by HORIZON EUROPE that will focus on the development of the political self in adolescence, bringing together perspectives from political science, political and social psychology, developmental neuroscience and affective sciences.
IP-PAD (Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Politics of Adolescence & Democracy) is a Doctoral Network that aims to address a timely, pressing societal issue, namely the understanding of how the developing cognition and brain of young adolescents influences how they process political information and their political behaviour.
IP-PAD will address this need by integrating the perspectives of social sciences (including political science, sociology, economics and other cognate disciplines) and psychological sciences (including developmental and affective neuroscience) to study, for the first time, the developing political brain and behaviour of Generation Alpha (born after 2010) across five European countries. It will do so by extending the seminal findings of cognitive and affective development, self-regulation, reward sensitivity and peer-influence on adolescent decision-making into the domains of political information processing and political behaviour.
The project will involve extensive collaborations between the following universities and organizations : University of Amsterdam (Netherlands), University of Vienna (Austria), Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences (Greece), Jagiellonian University (Poland) and Royal Holloway University of London (UK). Across all universities we have formed multidisciplinary supervisory teams with the participation of political scientists and political/social psychologists, cognitive and developmental neuroscientists and social scientists.
In addition, each Doctoral Candidate will undertake a period of secondment with one of our associate partners : the European Youth Parliament, the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, Gallup International, Counterpoint Global, Democracy Next and Public First.