European / International Joint Ph.D. in
Social Representation and Communication

Programme Director

Annamaria Silvana de Rosa, Ph.D. in Psychology is Full Professor of Social Representations and Communication: with integrated experimental laboratory on New Media at the Faculty of Medicine and Psychology - University of Rome “Sapienza”, Italy; Rector’s Delegate for EUA-CDE Council of Doctoral Education, she has played as leading motor for the Internationalisation of doctoral education in Europe and worldwide (see the Selected list of A.S. de Rosa's publications on Institutional Programs and Scientific Digital Infrastructure. She held a position of institution-wide responsibility role for international doctoral education, as Director of Sapienza Coordination Program for International Doctorates since 2009 and as Rector Delegate in the EUA-CDE Council of Doctoral Education, since its inception, and member of the Board of Directors of the International Relations. 

She is the creator of first pioneering international joint doctorate, awarding a mutually recognized “European doctoral diploma” under the joint signatures of the rectors of the network universities: the European/International Joint PhD in Social Representations and Communication, that since 1993 has been approved by the European Commission (DG-Education and Culture and DG - Research) as well as by the Ministries for Scientific Research and Higher Education of Italy, France, the Czech Republic and Romania and sponsored by the French social sciences Foundation Maison des Sciences de l'Homme (FMSH). (http://www.europhd.net/europeaninternational-joint-phd-institutional-history-and-recognition-0),  Prof. de Rosa acted as Coordinator of the  European/International Joint PhD in Social Representations and Communication (since its implementation in 1996 until her retirement in 2020) – as well as SoReCom THEmatic NETwork,.  and as Director (2010-2020) designated by the Core Executive Committee as scientist responsible for the scientific management of the European/International Joint Ph.D. programme and its related activities, under the auspices of Serge Moscovici, 1st Former Director of the Program (1996-2010) and Honorary Director until his death in 2014 . Even after her retirement in November 2020, Prof. de Rosa has continued to dedicate a great commitment to ensure the continuity and development of the international doctorate, that has been relaunched in the academic year 2022-2023 under the label of Joint International Doctorate in Social Representations, Culture and Communication, that has started with an introductive session by the  new co-ordinator Mauro Sarrica and the 1st opening invited training session of 4 hours on November 7, 2022 by Annamaria Silvana de Rosa (https://phd.uniroma1.it/web/JOINT-INTERNATIONAL-DOCTORATE-IN-SOCIAL-REPRESENTATIONS,-CULTURE-AND-COMMUNICATION_nD3857_EN.aspx.

In order to illustrate the interrelated institutional, scientific and didactic peculiarities of the International Joint Doctorate in Social Representations, Culture and Communication, emphasizing its international, supra-disciplinary, intersectoral value coherent with its main theoretical and paradigmatic present the wider geo-cultural context in which this International Joint Doctorate operates (Europe, North and Latino America, Asia and Africa) and to valorize both commitment of long-term partnership and  openness to new institutional collaborations,  she has also organized and jointly chaired with Mauro Sarrica a Round Table articulated in two  sessions  has been organized in the XII Jornada Internacional de Representações Sociais e IX Conferência Brasileira de Representações Sociais (linkare con https://www.2023.jirs.com.br) (Rio de Janeiro, 16-19 April 2023) introduced by the leading signatory Sapienza University from Europe (Italy) with presentations in the first by some historic partner Universities from North America (Canada) and  Latino America (Argentina and Brazil); and in the second from historic and new partners from Ásia (Cina and Indonesia) and África (Tunisia for North Africa and South Africa).

Fully operational since 1996, the original network of 13 European universities has since grown to 28 universities, research institutes and SMEs in 18 countries around the world. 17 universities in 10 European countries (AT, CZ, FR, IT, PT, RO, SK, ES, CH, UK) and 7 universities from North America, Latin America and China, 1 national research institute (IFSTTAR) in France; 1 social sciences foundation (FMSH) and 3 enterprises partners in Netherland, Italy and Sweden. Among them 16 associated partners have been chosen and have recently adhered to the PEOPLE-ITN SoReComJoint-IDP project (13 universities, 2 private companies, 1 national research institute IFSTTAR with intensive and extensive cooperation with the private sector) in 8 European countries (Austria, Czech Republic, France, Italy, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland) and in 6 extra-European countries (Argentina, Brazil, Canada, China, Mexico, United States). Within the FP7 PEOPLE-ITN-2013 programme, the SoReComJoint-IDP project has been selected as being the best among the 1147 submitted proposals, obtaining mark of 98,80/100 (threshold: 70/100).

The European/International Joint PhD in Social Representations and Communication programme has been identified as an example of ‘best practices’ in higher education by the European Commission Directorate for Education and Culture, by the Italian and French Ministry for Scientific Research and Higher Education. In 2010 an award for the best paper has been released by the Joiman EC Project – Task Force 4 to the Scientific Coordinator of the European/International Joint PhD in Social Representations and Communication for the following paper: de Rosa, A.S. (2010). The Joint European/International Doctorate in Social Representations and Communication: an experience anticipating the Bologna process.

Within Sapienza University, she has held positions of responsibility as member since 1992 of the Core Committee on International Relations (CURI), creator and Director of the Sapienza Co-ordination Program for Joint International/European Doctorates and, since its creation in 2000, of the European/International Joint PhD in Social Representations and Communication Research Centre and Multimedia Lab, one of the most advanced High Tech labs at Sapienza University. Since 1992, she has directed, with excellent management skills, a long series of successful projects approved by the European Commission. These EC-contracts include: the Erasmus-Socrates programmes for Advanced Curriculum Development and Intensive Programmes approved by DG-Education and Culture (1993-2012), Training Mobility Researchers, the High Level Conference programmes, MSCA FP7 PEOPLE-ITN-2013.  Since 1995 until 2020 she has organized a successful series of 26 International Summer Schools and 40 International Lab Meetings, which were attended by 2418 participants: 1798 research trainees from 59 countries and 620 invited speakers from 31 countries.. 

Since 2000, she has been Coordinator of the Marie Curie Multi-partner Training Site on Social Representations and Communication approved by DG-Research. From 2004 to 2008 she was the scientist in charge of a series of 12 European/International Joint PhD International Lab Meetings funded under the Marie Curie Series of Scientific Events and is currently directing a new series of three scientific events per year (Winter, Spring and Summer Sessions), which will continue to integrate face-to-face meetings with on-line training courses for European/International Joint PhD research trainees and young doctoral and post-doctoral researchers from all over the world.

Since 2004 she has been Coordinator of the EU-approved SoReCom Thematic Network of excellence, a “network of networks” in the field of social representations highly integrated with the European/International Joint PhD in Social Representations and Communication. She has also been the coordinator of two internationalization programmes sponsored by the Italian Ministry of Higher Education and since 2002 has served as Coordinator of the Vinci Programme funded by the French and Italian Ministries of Higher Education. In 2004 the European University Association (EUA) designated her the main coordinator of the “Network of Networks project, part of their Europe wide study on the status and future of doctoral education. As Rector’s Delegate for EUA-CDE Council of Doctoral Education, she has regularly and actively attended all EUA international workshops and those organized on doctoral education by other international associations like EAHEP and UNICA. She has also been invited to organize the EUA-CDE Working Group on the Internationalisation of Doctorate and International Joint Doctorate (March 2010). For many years, she has been the Erasmus Institutional Coordinator as the delegate of the Rector of the University of Rome Sapienza for the Socrates programme, the European University Association, the UNICA network and a member of the Board of Directors of EuroPACE, a trans-European network of universities specialized in open distance education and training.

Prof. de Rosa has been invited as an international expert to evaluate research programmes of the Canadian Fonds pour la Formation de Chercheurs et l’Aide à la Recherche (FCAR) in Québec since 1995, by the Italian Ministry of Scientific Research (MIUR) since 1998, by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (CRSH) since 2002, by the European Science Foundation (ESF) since, the Belgian Federal Science Policy Office since 2008, by the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF) since 2008.

She has also been invited as an international expert to evaluate the contribution of the Framework Programmes to the development of Human Research Capacity for the IDEA Consult in consortium iFQ (Institute for research Information and Quality Assurance) and PPMI (Public Policy and Management Institute) within a study commissioned by the European Commission, that will serve as input to the FP7 ex-post evaluation and the optimisation of the on-going H2020 programme and future EC programmes.

Prof. de Rosa also organized the 8th International Conference on Social Representations in 2006, has been invited as the keynote speaker at more than four hundred international conferences and as member of the Advisory Board for many International Congresses both in her scientific field (Social Representations) and concerning the EHEA and ERA. She is invited Member of UCP-SARnet Advisory Board and of the Réseau Mondial Serge Moscovici.

Since 1980 she has been invited as a visiting professor at a number of universities in Europe (Ecole des Hautes Etudes, Paris; Laboratoire Européen de Psychologie Sociale at the Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, Paris; London School of Economic and University of Surrey, UK; Helsinki University, Finland; Istituto Superior Psicologia Applicada, Lisbon, Portugal; Universidad del Pais Vasco - San Sebastian Spain; University of Vienna, Austria; University Alexandru Iona Cuza”, Iasi, Romania, among many others), in the US (Irvine California University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Pittsburgh, CUNY, New York), in Canada (University of Montréal, University of Ottawa), in Latin America (in Argentina, University of Buenos Aires; in Brazil: University of Salvador de Bahia, Universities of Porto Allegre, Recife and Ribeirao Preto, Pontificia Universidade Catolica do Rio Grande do Sul, Pontifícia Universidade Católica - San Paolo; Universidad Federale de Santa Caterina, Florianopolis; in Mexico: Autonomous University of Mexico City; Autonomous University of Puebla; Universidad Veracruzana), Asia (Beijing Normal University and Renmin University in Beijing, Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, Nankai University and Tianjin University of Technology and Education in Tianjin,  China and Jakarta University, Indonesia) and Africa (University of Tunis).

In 2010 she was also awarded a Doctorate Honoris Causa by the University A.I. Cuza of Iasi (Romania).

In 2011 she has been awarded a Fulbright Schuman Grant by the Commission for Educational Exchange between the United States of America, Belgium and Luxembourg for the research project on “The Joint International Doctorate: a strategic tool for enhancing EU-US institutional collaboration on research training in a worldwide network-based knowledge society” (Host University: University of California, Irvine; Period: August 2011 – January 2012).

In  2018 she has been also designated  as Emeritus Professor at University of Belgrano, Buenos Aires (Argentina) and in 2019 as Adjoint Professor at University of Ottawa (Canada) .    

Prof. de Rosa is member of many Scientific Associations, including: the American Psychological Associations (APS), the European Association of Experimental Social Psychology (EAESP), the International Association for Research in Economic Psychology (IAREP), the Society for Advancement of Behavioural Economics (SABE), the Association of Internet Researchers (AoIR), the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology (IACCP), the International Association of Applied Psychology (IAAP), the European Community Psychology Association (ECPA), International Society of Political Psychology (ISPP), the European Society on Family Relations (ESFR), the International Association on Facet Theory, the Italian Society of Relational Psychology and Psychotherapy (Società Italiana di Psicologia Relazionale e Psicoterapia), the Italian Association of Psychology (Associazione Italiana di Psicologia AIP), the Italian Association of Psychology of Tourism (ARIPT).

Among other editorial responsibilities, she is often invited to review manuscript proposals on social representations for publishers, acting as consultant for the Series “Cultural Dynamics of Social Representations” (Routledge Editions), for various editorial projects of the IGI Global publisher (Pennsylvania) and as director of the new multi-language (English-Italian-French) editorial series: “Social Representations and Communication: Media and Society” (Edizioni Unicopli, Milan, 2011).

She is on the editorial board of numerous journals of social psychology (Papers on Social Representations, Psychologie et Société, Revista de Psicologia Social, Cahiers GEIRSO, Psihologia Sociala, Societal and Political Psychology International Review, Rassegna di Psicologia, Giornale di Psicologia, Revista de Pesquisas Interdisciplinares, Journal of Pacific Rim Psychology) and she is reviewer for international journals such as the Journal of Theory and Social Behaviour; European Journal of Social Psychology; Asian Journal of Social Psychology; British Journal of Social Psychology; Swiss Journal of Psychology; European Psychologist; Cahiers internationaux de psychologie sociale ; Psychologie francçaise; Qualitative Research in Psychology; Cahiers GEIRSO; Revista de Psicologia Social; Papers on Social Representations; Psihologia Sociala; Journal of Economic Psychology; European Journal of Psychology of Education, Revista de Pesquisas Interdisciplinares, Journal of Pacific Rim Psychology, among others.

Prof. de Rosa is the author of more than 750 scientific contributions, including more than 260 publications in the supra-disciplinary field of Social Sciences inspired by the theory of Social Representations and active participation as invited keynote speaker or symposium organiser in more than 495 conferences in international and national conferences in Social Psychology and other Social Sciences and in the fields of Innovative Doctoral Education and of Digital Libraries and ICT applied to Higher Education.

In 2014 Prof. de Rosa has been selected as Sapienza University representative and expert to intervene during the parallel workshop on “Internationalisation in doctoral training: collaborative projects, co-tutelle, joint doctorates”, within the conference ‘International, Intersectoral, and Interdisciplinary: the triple “i” approach to doctoral training’ (Padua, 20 -21 November 2014), organised by the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research, in collaboration with the University of Padua and the University of Camerino, and with the expert advice of the EUA-Council for Doctoral Education. under the auspices of the Italian Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

She has also provided 162 contributions (including welcome address, key lectures, training, methodological sessions, thematic sessions, group training on meta-theoretical analysis, interviews "for a biography of a theory" with multi-generational leading scholars, etc.) in the multiyear series of the 26 International Summer Schools and 40 International Lab Meetings she has organised since 1995 to 2020 for the European/International Joint PhD in Social Representations and Communication.

In the field of social representations she has developed the “modelling paradigmatic approach”, based on the integration/differentiation of multi-theoretical constructs and multi-methodological research designs. One of the largest research program – from a meta-theoretical perspective - that she launched and is leading since 1994 is aimed to take stock of the scientific field inspired by social representation theory developed in more than 60 years by mapping its development, its paradigmatic approaches and methods, the thematic areas and their impact on the various applied fields within the multi-generational community of scientists, across different geo-cultural contexts and recently disseminated “within” and “by” Academic Social Network.. The Social Representation theory represents the unifying epistemological inspiration of her research programs, including a variety of thematic topic, such as (among others): madness and mental illness; environment and tourism; national, supra-national and place identity; city-branding of the European Capitals via traditional and new media; the social representations and urban mobility practices of a European Capital (Paris) from “overground” and “underground” perspective; advertising and communication; social memory and emotional impact of traumatic events; interpersonal perception and family relationships; social representations of current, future and ideal family; temporal perspective, social representations and metaphors of the stock market in traditional and new media, investors and financial advisors from various European countries and China; social representations of psychoanalysis in the era of Facebook; polemical representations about environmental/economic ideological conflicts : the case of TAV / No-TAV movement on the streets and in the social networks; 99% versus 1% polemical representations about financial-economic issues: putting finance “under accusation” by Occupy Wall Street from the US to Europe and China; more recently on social representations of  immigrants/migrants/refugees, social memory  and multi-dimensional identities and integration processes in the host/destination country and communicative dimensions within face-to-face and virtual reality of socio-interpersonal networks from the origin and host country.

One of her books is entitled «Social Representations in the Social Arena» (Routledge, 2013).

(see the List of A.S. de Rosa’s publications  and conferences)

She is also the creator of the So.Re.Com. “A.S. de Rosa” @-library, a multipurpose digital environment of interrelated relational databases conceived in the logic of the semantic web, including multiple web interfaces aimed to integrate documentation services, with networking and research training. This @-library supports access to multiple repositories and web-tools, designed by A.S. de Rosa and implemented on the EuroPhD website, currently evolving into a new advanced platform for knowledge discovery, sharing and analysis and to support researchers networking and collaboration. By implementing additional capabilities such as enriching publications with additional bibliographic metadata, provide bibliometric indicators, add authors and institutions profiles, researchers networking tools, etc., the platform will not only allow comprehensive and accurate bibliographic searches, but will also enable sophisticated analyses aimed at identifying relevant dynamics within the researchers community, such as collaboration patterns, semantic clusters, research trends, scientific impact and other emerging properties that can be captured with a bottom-up analytical approach. Furthermore, the integration of social networking tools aimed at scholars will enhance collaboration among scholars, thus helping promoting both the development of the discipline and the careers of the members of this community see the Selected list of A.S. de Rosa’s publications on Institutional Programs and Scientific Digital Infrastructure.

In 2014, prof. de Rosa has established a strong collaboration with Elsevier for joint research activity on the impact of the bibliometric culture and its practice in the scientific community she leads and for the exponential technical development of the So.Re.Com. “A.S. de Rosa” @-library