Frontal, amygdalar, and temporal convergence in the primate ventral striatum: implications for Huntington’s disease

Huntington’s disease (HD) is a debilitating neurodegenerative disease that is part of a class of diseases affecting the basal ganglia, a group of subcortical structures in the brain. Impaired negative emotion recognition is a common and early symptom of HD, and entails the patient being unable to properly identify negative emotions on human faces. Through analysis of cell label patterns in a macaque cortex with a retrograde tracer, a region in the ventromedial striatum has been identified with the potential to function as a critical hub in the emotion processing networks. This region of the striatum receives projections from cortical and subcortical regions involved with emotion processing, including the amygdala, ventromedial prefrontal cortex, orbitofrontal cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, and temporal lobe. Analysis of the region of the striatum receiving the projections above will be evaluated to provide more insight into the link between the progression of the pathophysiology of HD and the symptoms of HD over time. The identification of this hub has the potential to broaden our understanding of symptomatology and progression in HD, contribute to other projects in neuropsychiatric disorders involving the striatum, and provide further data for the study of brain connectivity as a whole

Huthwaite play project

Huthwaite Play Project is a joint venture between Ashfield District Council (ADC), the University of Derby's Childhood Studies students and staff and involves representatives of local community in the north Nottinghamshire village of Huthwaite. A key aim of the project is to provide feedback to the Council to support the improvement of two local parks known as Brierley Forest Park and Huthwaite Welfare Park as identified in the Council's Locality Plan. Huthwaite Play Project incorporated two phases: phase one took place in the autumn of 2015 whereby site evaluations and children's views about park provision were gathered. Phase two took place in February 2016 and included meeting parents of very young children at the local Sure Start Centre as well as talking with older children and young people who attended a local youth club in the village on a Friday evening

Young children’s views on play provision in two local parks: A research project by early childhood studies students and staff

This article describes a collaborative research project which aimed to elicit the views of children, young people and the local community in relation to the play provision within two local parks that were in need of renovation. It involved 13 undergraduate students on a BA (Hons) Early Childhood Studies degree, academics, a local landscape architect, children in two local schools, young people from the local youth club and parents attending the local Sure-Start centre. This article focuses on phase 1 of the project which involved undergraduate students and staff in primary research with children in two schools.13 third year students were enrolled on an option module entitled ‘Creative Opportunities and Possibilities’ which required them to evaluate an outdoor space as part of the module assessment. These students engaged in primary research and produced evaluations of each park, based on photographs and notes taken from site visits. This was followed by primary research with two year 2 classes in two local schools. Findings clearly identified that traditional playground equipment was important to children as well as ‘risky’ play features. Children also preferred play equipment for different ages on the same site, so they could play alongside older and younger siblings. Short term or semi-permanent provision was very popular and a keen interest in nature was expressed. The children’s knowledge and awareness of health and safety was a key finding and they were already very risk-averse. The researchers conclude that involving children in primary research needs careful planning and researchers need to be mindful of how children’s authentic voices can be heard and how they are positioned within the research. Constraints to the approach were recognised, the students were inexperienced researchers and as such the depth and complexity of the data was limited.N/