Human Service Needs in Rapidly Growing Western Communities: The Wyoming House Services Project-One Response

Human service needs in rural, western communities currently experiencing energy related growth are abundant. This paper describes and critiques a service delivery project designed to address these needs

The inclusive teacher educator: spaces for civic engagement

This paper is concerned with the teacher educator who is aspiring to be inclusive. It considers the obligations which arise within Higher Education Institutions and the extent to which these contribute to a loss of civic engagement and a lack of capacity to pursue inclusion, social justice and equity. The paper argues that this need not be the case and a reorientation for teacher educators is offered which affords teacher educators opportunities to, in Bourdieu’s (1998) terms, ‘play seriously’. This reorientation is in relation to three significant spaces – the ontological, the aesthetic and the epiphanic – and it is argued that operating within these spaces could enable new practices of inclusive teacher education to emerge

Hair cortisol-a stress marker in children and adolescents with chronic tic disorders? A large European cross-sectional study

Background There is clear evidence that tic disorders (TDs) are associated with psychosocial stress as well as emotional and behavioral problems. Studies have shown that individuals with TDs have higher acute physiological stress responses to external, single stressors (as reflected by saliva cortisol). The aim of the present study was to examine a physiological marker of longer-term stress (as reflected by hair cortisol concentration) in children and adolescents with TDs and unaffected siblings of individuals with TDs. Methods Two samples of a European cohort were included in this study. In the COURSE sample, 412 children and adolescents aged 3–16 years with a chronic TD including Tourette syndrome according to DSM IV-TR criteria were included. The ONSET sample included 131 3–10 years old siblings of individuals with TDs, who themselves had no tics. Differences in hair cortisol concentration (HCC) between the two samples were examined. Within the COURSE sample, relations of HCC with tic severity and perceived psychosocial stress as well as potential effects and interaction effects of comorbid emotional and behavioral problems and psychotropic medication on HCC were investigated. Results There were no differences in HCC between the two samples. In participants with TDs, there were no associations between HCC and tic severity or perceived psychosocial stress. No main effects of sex, psychotropic medication status and comorbid emotional and behavioral problems on HCC were found in participants with TDs. Conclusion A link between HCC and TDs is not supported by the present result