The Emilia-Romagna Region is launching a campaign to raise awareness of the risks of excessive use of digital devices

(Il Sole 24 Ore Radiocor) – “Don’t ignore the most important notifications!” This is the message at the heart of the new awareness campaign launched by the Emilia-Romagna Region to promote a more responsible use of digital tools, protect children from the risks of excessive screen time, and refocus attention on the quality of relationships and the role of adults. The desire for a hug, to share a game, a little secret or a moment to sing a duet together are not messages that come from a screen, but requests for time or a listening ear that come in real life from the people around us, first and foremost children and teenagers. And so they cannot be set aside.

The content forming the basis of the regional communication campaign is inspired precisely by this idea. The campaign comprises nine posters, a video advert, a multilingual kit containing information material and suggestions for fun and recreational activities, all distributed through the regional hubs. In addition to this, Emilia-Romagna has made a campaign website available to the public, translated into English, French, Spanish and Arabic, containing all the materials and information: from the risks of early screen exposure to alternative activities that parents can do with their children, right through to answers to frequently asked questions. These range from advice on how to help children fall asleep without the use of screens, or how to deal with them when they throw a tantrum if a tablet is taken away, to suggestions on how to avoid resorting to a smartphone, transforming time spent together into simple yet imaginative activities.

Launched in October in Bologna with digital totems at the central station, large-scale posters, digital totems and dynamic adverts on the sides of buses, the campaign is now being rolled out to other regional capitals. In addition, billboards are also being displayed in the 56 municipalities in Emilia-Romagna with more than 15,000 inhabitants. Advertisements are also planned in regional daily newspapers, weekly publications and on websites. The campaign’s 30-second video advert will be screened from 14 to 20 December in six multiplex cinemas across Emilia-Romagna. The advert will also feature on YouTube and be broadcast on television channels across the region. On social media, the advertising campaign will launch in September and run until November.

In addition, 300 kits of printed materials were printed and distributed via 161 local hubs across Emilia-Romagna: family centres, family planning clinics, health and educational services, intercultural centres, libraries and spaces for children and young people. Each kit contains posters, leaflets in nine different designs, leaflets and postcards in Italian and multiple languages.

This campaign is “an important awareness-raising project that stems from the process launched by the 2025 General Assembly on Children and Adolescents,” explains the Councillor for Welfare, Third Sector, Children’s Policies and Schools, Isabella Conti – “where we chose to tackle this issue together with families, services, the scientific community, schools, educators and the third sector”. Excessive screen time is an issue “that certainly concerns adolescents, smartphones and social media, but which begins much earlier: in Emilia-Romagna, in fact, it already affects 11 per cent of children under five months and 39 per cent of those aged between 11 and 15 months – notes the Councillor - And the campaign effectively conveys the sense of responsibility that we, as institutions, have first and foremost towards parents, young women, young men, girls and boys. We need an educational community capable of reflecting together on the relationship we all have with digital technology, adults included. We cannot place the responsibility solely on young people, nor can we leave families to cope on their own.”