This book is a collection of chapters addressing various aspects of quality of life and health psychology from a biopsychosocial perspective. The book explores how health, climate, psychiatric diseases, and social conditions of specific geographical areas can impact quality of life.

This book presents the main findings of an empirical exploration of media discourses on social representations of “otherness” in seven European countries. It focuses on the analysis of press discourses produced over a fifteen-year period (2000–2015) on three contemporary figures of otherness that challenge the identity of European societies, question the attitudes towards diversity, and pose significant challenges for policy-makers: immigration, Islam, and LGBT. The book provides a comprehensive and articulate map of how national media addresses such themes from both synchronic and diachronic perspectives, revealing patterns of continuity and discontinuity across time and space. Lastly, it discusses these patterns in the light of their cultural meanings and their influence on social and political collective behaviours.

This is the first book that broadly delves into the theme of social exclusion and how it has changed through culture and society. It represents a very important, innovative, and current attempt to describe new forms of social exclusion in society and takes into account the contribution of different disciplines with different points of view.