Stress and Poverty

(1) Introducing the topic (MB, EK, CS)

(2) The beginnings of stress research: Hans Selye (MB)

(3) Oxidative Stress (MB)

(4) Endocrinological and neurological stress research (MB)

(5) Psychological stress research with a focus on poverty (EK, CS)

(6) The experience of poverty in its multidimensionality (EK, CS)

(7) Biographical evidence of people experiencing poverty (EK, CS)

(8) A biological commentary on "poverty and stress" (MB)

(9) Normative questions: Who causes stress, who benefits, who suffers? (EK, CS)

(10) Responses and coping strategies (MB, EK, CS)

Michael Breitenbach is a retired full professor of Genetics at the University of Salzburg in Austria. He has published 230 research and review papers and edited more than 10 books in the fields of the genetics of aging and stress response. He has received a number of national and international honors for his work in genetics, including being elected as a fellow of the AAAS. His main interest in research in the last 30 years has been the utilization of the yeast genetic system to study basic eukaryotic molecular biology, in particular the mechanism and the results of oxidative stress.

Elisabeth Kapferer holds a doctoral degree in German literature studies. She is member of the research staff at the Centre for Ethics and Poverty Research at the University of Salzburg, Austria. Her research activities, which include several (co-)authored and (co-)edited publications, focus on poverty and social exclusion in wealthy societies. Her main research interests are representations of poverty in the arts, public discourse on poverty, and poverty-related disparities in education and health. She is member of the scientific advisory board of the Austrian Health Promotion Fund (Fonds Gesundes Österreich).

Clemens Sedmak holds doctoral degrees in philosophy, theology and social theory. He is professor of social ethics at the Keough School of Global Affairs and concurrent professor of theology at the University of Notre Dame, IN. He is also Co-Director of the Centre for Ethics and Poverty Research, University of Salzburg, Austria. He works at the intersection of poverty studies and ethics. Recent Publications include The Practice of Human Development and Dignity, co-edited with Paolo Carozza, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press 2020, and Subsidiarität: Tragendes Prinzip menschlichen Zusammenlebens, with W. Blum, H. P. Gaisbauer, Regensburg: Friedrich Pustet 2021.