The Italian jihadist scene, with its fluid profile and features, has been analyzed on different occasions by academics and experts. Their publications however, followed a qualitative approach; apart from some real case analysis, there is a vacuum in the quantitative research that needs to be filled.

The aim of this short paper is to statistically analyze data on some of the risk factors of jihadist violent radicalization proposed by the prevailing academic literature; the goal is to fill the abovementioned gap in the research and promote a more thorough analysis to verify whether there are warning signs that can alert social workers or security services about individuals on the path towards violent radicalization.

The data are limited in numbers, and related only to foreign terrorist fighters (FTFs) involved in the Syrian – Iraqi conflict. The individuals observed are those listed by the Italian government in the FTF national record, with information obtained through open sources (OSINT). The principal goal of this paper is to verify the existence of shared radicalization risk factors in the Italian FTFs milieu, highlighting the possible trajectories exploited by jihadist recruiters and propagandists.

However, it is necessary to highlight the fact that this work is only a theoretical hypothesis, which should be validated by other studies with a broader sample size. Furthermore, results should not be taken literally, because a theoretical model cannot capture the psychological, personal and societal variables in the real world.