Using Digital Storytelling to communicate chemical risks in food to high school students.

The research project, “ Chemical risk in food: comparing web- and paper-based communication tools ” , funded by the Italian Ministry of Health, intended to make a comparative assessment of the most effective tools to use in communication campaigns on chemical risks associated with food. The aim of the project was to raise awareness among adolescents about the problem of food safety and, as a result, to reduce the risk of exposure to chemical contaminants contained in food The objective of the project was to build a message and to disseminate it to a sample of young people aged between 16 and 18 in North East Italy, by means of two tools: one web- and the other paper-based. The choice of storytelling, as a method to develop the message on both the web- and the paper- based tools, is one of the more innovative aspects of the project pilot. Storytelling was identified as a technique able to facilitate understanding of scientific notions and to foster learning by emotionally involving the target. The use of this technique can be considered absolutely original in the communication of risk for consumer safety. Evaluation showed that the use of the storytelling technique had a positive impact on the target involved. From the data collected through the evaluation questionnaires, it was found that most of the young people (83%) considered the technique to be an effective means of communication able to attract the curiosity of their peers. Besides being an important innovation in the field of food risk communications, the direct involvement of the students in designing the communication tools in the early stages of the project and their participation in building the Digital Storytelling product proved to be a means of arousing the curiosity not only of the spectators but also of the students involved in the participatory process. Implementation of the storytelling technique actually required the young people to reflect on their own experience and daily life and to build a narrative related to the subject in question. In particular, the results of the analyses showed that, of the various elements used to build the tool, the students who saw the Digital Storytelling product reported appreciating that the actors were people of their own age, indicating this as an effective way of conveying the communication message to the identified target