Digital Practices, Communicative Codes and Social Inequalities: a Case Study During the Pandemic in Italy

This paper analyses the complex relationship between digital practices, communicative codes and social inequalities in the period of the pandemic in Italy, through the analysis of data collected from a broader research project based on a web survey administered to 13,473 Italians. The study examined the use of social media by the respondents to acquire information on the Covid 19 emergency situation. After having carried out a theoretical overview, making reference to the perspective of Mannheim - above all in the direction developed by Bernstein - multiple regression models were constructed; these were aimed at identifying possible relationships between aspects related to the use of social media as an information source and the degree of trust in the information conveyed, and the socio-cultural and occupational conditions of the respondents. The main results showed that disadvantaged groups are more inclined than other groups to find and trust information on social media, as this channel responds to the horizontal mode of communication that is more consistent with the specific code they possess.