The EASP Travel Grant gave me the opportunity to travel to Lisbon, Portugal to visit Dr. Mauro Bianchi and visit both ISCTE-IUL University and Lusófona University.

Filled with enthusiasm, I left from Trieste to Lisbon ready to start my journey. The flight from Rome was the easiest way to reach my destination. I was really pleased to spend some time in Rome before leaving. No best option, since I was shown around and spoiled with lovely food by Valeria, a friend (PhD student from Rome) whom I met during the EASP Summer School 2018 in Zürich (yes, the Summer School was great also because of the lovely people I met and with whom I hope to continue collaborating in the future!).

The main reason for my visit in Portugal was to write a review on the effects of touch at the intrapersonal, interpersonal and importantly within intergroup contexts. As soon as I arrived in Lisbon, I met Dr. Mauro Bianchi and in the following days we started organizing the paper. I finished writing the paper within my stay in Lisbon and it is now under revision and I am very happy about the final result.

I had the chance of meeting Dr. Mauro Bianchi at the beginning of my PhD but never had the chance to work side-a-side with him. It was a pleasure to exchange ideas with him in such a collaborative way that made this experience really helpful for me. In addition to writing the review, I had the possibility of joining the PsyChange lab in ISCTE-IUL where researchers and PhD students exchange opinions and ideas in a warm and motivated environment. One important aspect of my stay was the presentation of my work to the PsyChange group who not only allowed me to build more experience in presenting my work but also gave me valuable feedback on it.

During my stay I also participated in a workshop organized at ISCTE-IUL on experimental softwares used in psychology from which I learned a lot. Also, I had the possibility of attending different presentations by experts in different fields of psychology. Attending different meetings is always a precious opportunity to rethink about one’s own work from other perspectives.

In sum, although my stay only lasted one month, I really do think this experience made me grow as a PhD student and I thank EASP for giving me the opportunity of making this period abroad happen.