Purpose – In order to face the new competitive scenario, Italian universities are involved in a change process and are trying to adopt an entrepreneurial approach to better serve their customers/students. The paper aims to assess university performance by testing student satisfaction. It tries to provide universities with some solutions to improve its performance. Design/methodology/approach – The case of the University of Bari has been analysed by interviewing a random (but well stratified) sample of students in order to test their satisfaction concerning services provided and quality perceived. Reasons why students decide to enrol at the University of Bari are also investigated. Findings – Universities have to concentrate their efforts on the improvement of quality of teaching and non-teaching services, in order to promptly respond to the target, and foster a stronger relationship with surrounding economic and productive systems. Research implications/limitations – Universities need to adopt a customer centric approach. Future research should analyse the reform period experienced by the Italian University system, in order to investigate student satisfaction concerning recent changes. Moreover, a cross-country analysis of student satisfaction, through the servqual questionnaire, would be interesting. Practical implications – Student satisfaction at the University of Bari is higher for working students that are not interested in “additional” services. On the contrary, several improvements are perceived as urgent concerning non-core services provided, in which regular students are very interested. Originality/value – This paper provides a wide analysis of the services perception tested and viewed through student eyes.

In recent years, environmental problems have become a serious issue worldwide due to the increasing damage caused by climate change. People’s environmental awareness has grown, and public opinion is now demanding effective action from governments. Young people around the world are playing an important role in this, with the Fridays For Future movement, calling on policymakers to make environmental protection one of their political priorities. Through a survey of 1,975 high school students, this paper aims to contribute to the study of young people’s sustainable behaviors and their awareness to take effective action against environmental degradation, to explore their concerns and opinions about environmental issues, and to find out what ecological practices they are willing to adopt in their daily lives. Data analysis is conducted using tree-based methods to examine the sustainable behaviors and define the key practices that constitute them. The results of classification tree show that sustainable behaviors impact lifestyles, whether through less demanding actions such as turning off the faucet or appliances, or willingness to work as a volunteer, among others. The Random Forest provides us with a ranked list of sustainable behaviors that young people engage in to reduce and stop environmental degradation. The results of this study may be of interest to policy makers who need to plan educational pathways for students from elementary school to university, as environmental culture must be a cornerstone of our society.

In recent years, the increasing number of natural disasters has raised concerns about the sustainability of our planet’s future. As young people comprise the generation that will suffer from the negative effects of climate change, they have become involved in a new climate activism that is also gaining interest in the public debate thanks to the Fridays for Future (FFF) movement. This paper analyses the results of a survey of 1,138 young people in a southern Italian region to explore their perceptions of the extent of environmental problems and their participation in protests of green movements such as the FFF. The statistical analyses perform an ordinal classification tree using an original impurity measure considering both the ordinal nature of the response variable and the heterogeneity of its ordered categories. The results show that respondents are concerned about the threat of climate change and participate in the FFF to claim their right to a healthier planet and encourage people to adopt environmentally friendly practices in their lifestyles. Young people feel they are global citizens, connected through the Internet and social media, and show greater sensitivity to the planet’s environmental problems, so they are willing to take effective action to demand sustainable policies from decision-makers. When planning public policies that will affect future generations, it is important for policymakers to know the demands and opinions of key stakeholders, especially young people, in order to plan the most appropriate measures, such as climate change mitigation.

Hazelnut is a widespread nut species, especially present in Europe, that can be consumed raw or roasted thanks to its pleasant taste and nutritional properties. In addition to renowned beneficial properties hazelnuts contain several proteins capable of inducing food allergy in sensitized individuals, including Cor a 2 (a profilin), Cor a 8 (a lipid transfer protein), Cor a 9 (an 11S seed storage globulin, legumin-like), and Cor a 11 (a 7S seed storage globulin, vicilin-like). In the present paper we investigated the effectiveness of autoclave-based treatments in decreasing the allergic potential of hazelnut as assessed by submitting the treated material to an in vivo skin prick test and an in vitro immunoblot analysis, with sera of allergic individuals exposed to the treated food material. This preliminary analysis showed that autoclave treatment preceded by hydration and/or followed by drying seems to be a promising approach and appears to be effective in reducing the allergenicity of hazelnuts in most patients, probably due to the denaturation of most major and minor allergenic proteins. This work opens up the opportunity to produce hypoallergenic hazelnut derivatives that can be tolerated by allergic subjects.

Choosing the University to attend is an important decision that is made once or twice in a lifetime and has relevant effects for a person’s entire life. In such a process, advice from others, especially current students, is a powerful influencing factor. Therefore, understanding the factors that lead students to become active advocates for their university is strategically important. Social identity theory states that when students choose a university, the image of the institution becomes part of their identity. In case of strong positive identification, the resulting sense of pride enhances their own self-identity and brings positive benefits beyond simply obtaining an education, which are then passed on to everyone. The current study focuses on brand experience and brand reputation and uses a moderated mediation analysis to investigate the mechanisms by which current students can be tools for university choice. Stimulating word-of-mouth (WOM) implies the institution to have and maintain a good reputation and engage students to develop a positive brand experience and pride. This research contributes to the development of a greater strategic awareness of universities’ appeal to better tailor their orientation activities to current or prospective students.