www.ricercawar.com is a site for scientific research in cinical psychology and criminology dedicated to prevention of firearm’s abuse and contains scientific articles, news and other materials about Italian and worldwide situation of this problem.
In Europe, the EU Council Directive 91/477/EEC of 18 June 1991 on the control of the acquisition and possession of weapons establishes that Member States “shall allow the acquisition and possession of firearms only by persons who have good cause and who: ... are not likely to be a danger to themselves, to public order or to public safety”.
Remains however to be defined what kind of psychopathological approach is needed to prevent the risk of weapons abuse. An effective assessment of people applying for firearms permits should ideally cover both the diagnostic aspects of their current psychopathological conditions and also, implicitly, a long-term forecast of the related risk of their damaging themselves and/or others.
This kind of assessment clearly demands a more complex evaluation than is usually necessary in routine clinical activity. The clinical-diagnostic concept of “Weapons Abuse Risk” (WAR), presented in this site, is in development within a framework of multidisciplinary - psychiatric, psychological and criminological –cooperation.

Authors
The research is promoted by:
- Carlo Alfredo Clerici, a physician specialized in clinical psychology and researcher at the Psychology Section of the Department of Biomedical Sciences and Technologies of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Milan;
- Angelo de’Micheli, psychologist and clinical criminologist occupying the Criminology chair at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Milan.

Other work group members include:
- Laura Veneroni, a psychologist specializing in clinical psychology;
- Cesare Albasi, a psychologist specialized in clinical psychology and researcher at the Department of Psychology of the Faculty of Psychology of the University of Turin;
- Valeria Pirro, a psychologist specializing in clinical psychology;
- Roberto Invernizzi, a solicitor;
- Annamaria Cescon, a physician specialized in clinical psychology at the Niguarda Ca' Granda General Hospital in Milan;
- Isabella Merzagora Betsos, associate professor of Criminology at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Milan;
- Roberto Carlo Rossi, vice president of the Professional Association of Physicians, Surgeons and Dentists in Milan;
- Antonio Vitello, director of the Forensic Medicine Service at the Città di Milano Local Public Health Unit.

Internal Links:
- The risk
- The research
- The authors
- Bibliography
- International Researches
- Texts and videos
- Links