Exploring Diurnal Cortisol Rhythms of Kindergarten Teachers in Kosovo and Ukraine.

This study explores whether certain combinations of individual and environmental experiences of teachers in LMICs may result in stress, assessed as patterns of diurnal cortisol rhythm. Participants were kindergarten teachers in Kosovo and Ukraine, two LMICs in Europe. Latent Profile Analysis identified three subgroups of teachers that significantly differed on teachers' education and experience. Preliminary results of Latent Growth Modeling suggested differences between profiles in baseline waking cortisol and patterns of diurnal decline. Teachers in the profile that was characterized by the longest experience working in the field but the lowest level of education showed blunted cortisol in the morning and a flatter slope; a pattern that could indicate a maladaptive cortisol response. Future directions for studying stress processes among teachers in LMICs and implications for policy and practice on how to support teacher well-being in low-resource contexts are discussed. PMID: 30653277 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: American Journal of Community Psychology - Category: Psychiatry Tags: Am J Community Psychol Source Type: research