79 resultados para CENTRAL SET
em Helda - Digital Repository of University of Helsinki
Resumo:
The aim of this thesis was to study the seismic tomography structure of the earth s crust together with earthquake distribution and mechanism beneath the central Fennoscandian Shield, mainly in southern and central Finland. The earthquake foci and some fault plane solutions are correlated with 3-D images of the velocity tomography. The results are discussed in relation to the stress field of the Shield and with other geophysical, e.g. geomagnetic, gravimetric, tectonic, and anisotropy studies of the Shield. The earthquake data of the Fennoscandian Shield has been extracted from the Nordic earthquake parameter data base which was founded at the time of inception of the earthquake catalogue for northern Europe. Eight earlier earthquake source mechanisms are included in a pilot study on creating a novel technique for calculating an earthquake fault plane solution. Altogether, eleven source mechanisms of shallow, weak earthquakes are related in the 3-D tomography model to trace stresses of the crust in southern and central Finland. The earthquakes in the eastern part of the Fennoscandian Shield represent low-active, intraplate seismicity. Earthquake mechanisms with NW-SE oriented horizontal compression confirm that the dominant stress field originates from the ridge-push force in the North Atlantic Ocean. Earthquakes accumulate in coastal areas, in intersections of tectonic lineaments, in main fault zones or are bordered by fault lines. The majority of Fennoscandian earthquakes concentrate on the south-western Shield in southern Norway and Sweden. Onwards, epicentres spread via the ridge of the Shield along the west-coast of the Gulf of Bothnia northwards along the Tornio River - Finnmark fault system to the Barents Sea, and branch out north-eastwards via the Kuusamo region to the White Sea Kola Peninsula faults. The local seismic tomographic method was applied to find the terrane distribution within the central parts of the Shield the Svecofennian Orogen. From 300 local explosions a total of 19765 crustal Pg- and Sg-wave arrival times were inverted to create independent 3-D Vp and Vs tomographic models, from which the Vp/Vs ratio was calculated. The 3-D structure of the crust is presented as a P-wave and for the first time as an S-wave velocity model, and also as a Vp/Vs-ratio model of the SVEKALAPKO area that covers 700x800 km2 in southern and central Finland. Also, some P-wave Moho-reflection data was interpolated to image the relief of the crust-mantle boundary (i.e. Moho). In the tomography model, the seismic velocities vary smoothly. The lateral variations are larger for Vp (dVp =0.7 km/s) than for Vs (dVs =0.4 km/s). The Vp/Vs ratio varies spatially more distinctly than P- and S-wave velocities, usually from 1.70 to 1.74 in the upper crust and from 1.72 to 1.78 in the lower crust. Schist belts and their continuations at depth are associated with lower velocities and lower Vp/Vs ratios than in the granitoid areas. The tomography modelling suggests that the Svecofennian Orogen was accreted from crustal blocks ranging in size from 100x100 km2 to 200x200 km2 in cross-sectional area. The intervening sedimentary belts have ca. 0.2 km/s lower P- and S-wave velocities and ca. 0.04 lower Vp/Vs ratios. Thus, the tomographic model supports the concept that the thick Svecofennian crust was accreted from several crustal terranes, some hidden, and that the crust was later modified by intra- and underplating. In conclusion, as a novel approach the earthquake focal mechanism and focal depth distribution is discussed in relation to the 3-D tomography model. The schist belts and the transformation zones between the high- and low-velocity anomaly blocks are characterized by deeper earthquakes than the granitoid areas where shallow events dominate. Although only a few focal mechanisms were solved for southern Finland, there is a trend towards strike-slip and oblique strike-slip movements inside schist areas. The normal dip-slip type earthquakes are typical in the seismically active Kuusamo district in the NE edge of the SVEKALAPKO area, where the Archean crust is ca. 15-20 km thinner than the Proterozoic Svecofennian crust. Two near vertical dip-slip mechanism earthquakes occurred in the NE-SW junction between the Central Finland Granitoid Complex and the Vyborg rapakivi batholith, where high Vp/Vs-ratio deep-set intrusion splits the southern Finland schist belt into two parts in the tomography model.
Resumo:
In my master’s thesis I analyse mystical Islamic poetry in ritualistic performance context, samā` , focusing on the poetry used by the Chishti Sufis. The work is based on both literary sources and ethnographic material collected in India. The central textual source is Surūd-i Rūhānī, a compilation of mystical poetry. Textual sources, however, can be understood properly only in relation to the living performance context and therefore I also utilise interviews of Sufis and performers of mystical music and recordings of samā` assemblies along with texts. First part of the thesis concentrates on thematic overview of the poems and the process of selecting a suitable text for performance. The poems are written in three languages, viz. in Persian, Urdu and Hindi. Among the authors are both Sufis and non-Sufis. The poems, mystical and non-mystical alike, share the same poetic images and they acquire a mystical meaning when they are set to qawwali music and performed in samā` assemblies. My work includes several translations of verses not previously translated. Latter part of the thesis analyses the musical idiom of qawwali and the ways in which the impact of text on listeners is intensified in performance. Typically the intensification is accomplished in the level of a single poem through three different techniques: using introductory verses, inserting verses between the verses of the main poem and repeating individual units of text. The former two techniques are tied to creating a mystical state in the listeners while the latter aims at sustaining it. It is customary that a listener enraptured by mystical experience offers a monetary contribution to the performers. Thus, intensification of the text’s impact aims at enabling the listeners to experience mystical states.
Resumo:
In this dissertation, I present an overall methodological framework for studying linguistic alternations, focusing specifically on lexical variation in denoting a single meaning, that is, synonymy. As the practical example, I employ the synonymous set of the four most common Finnish verbs denoting THINK, namely ajatella, miettiä, pohtia and harkita ‘think, reflect, ponder, consider’. As a continuation to previous work, I describe in considerable detail the extension of statistical methods from dichotomous linguistic settings (e.g., Gries 2003; Bresnan et al. 2007) to polytomous ones, that is, concerning more than two possible alternative outcomes. The applied statistical methods are arranged into a succession of stages with increasing complexity, proceeding from univariate via bivariate to multivariate techniques in the end. As the central multivariate method, I argue for the use of polytomous logistic regression and demonstrate its practical implementation to the studied phenomenon, thus extending the work by Bresnan et al. (2007), who applied simple (binary) logistic regression to a dichotomous structural alternation in English. The results of the various statistical analyses confirm that a wide range of contextual features across different categories are indeed associated with the use and selection of the selected think lexemes; however, a substantial part of these features are not exemplified in current Finnish lexicographical descriptions. The multivariate analysis results indicate that the semantic classifications of syntactic argument types are on the average the most distinctive feature category, followed by overall semantic characterizations of the verb chains, and then syntactic argument types alone, with morphological features pertaining to the verb chain and extra-linguistic features relegated to the last position. In terms of overall performance of the multivariate analysis and modeling, the prediction accuracy seems to reach a ceiling at a Recall rate of roughly two-thirds of the sentences in the research corpus. The analysis of these results suggests a limit to what can be explained and determined within the immediate sentential context and applying the conventional descriptive and analytical apparatus based on currently available linguistic theories and models. The results also support Bresnan’s (2007) and others’ (e.g., Bod et al. 2003) probabilistic view of the relationship between linguistic usage and the underlying linguistic system, in which only a minority of linguistic choices are categorical, given the known context – represented as a feature cluster – that can be analytically grasped and identified. Instead, most contexts exhibit degrees of variation as to their outcomes, resulting in proportionate choices over longer stretches of usage in texts or speech.
Resumo:
Space in musical semiosis is a study of musical meaning, spatiality and composition. Earlier studies on musical composition have not adequately treated the problems of musical signification. Here, composition is considered an epitomic process of musical signification. Hence the core problems of composition theory are core problems of musical semiotics. The study employs a framework of naturalist pragmatism, based on C. S. Peirce’s philosophy. It operates on concepts such as subject, experience, mind and inquiry, and incorporates relevant ideas of Aristotle, Peirce and John Dewey into a synthetic view of esthetic, practic, and semiotic for the benefit of grasping musical signification process as a case of semiosis in general. Based on expert accounts, music is depicted as real, communicative, representational, useful, embodied and non-arbitrary. These describe how music and the musical composition process are mental processes. Peirce’s theories are combined with current morphological theories of cognition into a view of mind, in which space is central. This requires an analysis of space, and the acceptance of a relativist understanding of spatiality. This approach to signification suggests that mental processes are spatially embodied, by virtue of hard facts of the world, literal representations of objects, as well as primary and complex metaphors each sharing identities of spatial structures. Consequently, music and the musical composition process are spatially embodied. Composing music appears as a process of constructing metaphors—as a praxis of shaping and reshaping features of sound, representable from simple quality dimensions to complex domains. In principle, any conceptual space, metaphorical or literal, may set off and steer elaboration, depending on the practical bearings on the habits of feeling, thinking and action, induced in musical communication. In this sense, it is evident that music helps us to reorganize our habits of feeling, thinking, and action. These habits, in turn, constitute our existence. The combination of Peirce and morphological approaches to cognition serves well for understanding musical and general signification. It appears both possible and worthwhile to address a variety of issues central to musicological inquiry in the framework of naturalist pragmatism. The study may also contribute to the development of Peircean semiotics.
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The Gesture of Exposure On the presentation of the work of art in the modern art exhibition The topic of this dissertation is the presentation of art works in the modern art exhibition as being the established and conventionalized form of art encounter. It investigates the possibility of a theorization of the art exhibition as a separate object for research, and attempts to examine the relationship between the art work and its presentation in a modern art exhibition. The study takes its point of departure in the area vaguely defined as exhibition studies, and in the lack of a general problematization of the analytical tools used for closer examination of the modern art exhibition. Another lacking aspect is a closer consideration of what happens to the work of art when it is exposed in an art exhibition. The aim of the dissertation is to find a set of concepts that can be used for further theorization The art exhibition is here treated, on the one hand, as an act of exposure, as a showing gesture. On the other hand, the art exhibition is seen as a spatiality, as a space that is produced in the act of showing. Both aspects are seen to be intimately involved in knowledge production. The dissertation is divided into four parts, in which different aspects of the art exhibition are analyzed using different theoretical approaches. The first part uses the archaeological model of Michel Foucault, and discusses the exhibition as a discursive formation based on communicative activity. The second part analyses the derived concepts of gesture and space. This leads to the proposition of three metaphorical spatialities the frame, the agora and the threshold which are seen as providing a possibility for a further extension of the theory of exhibitions. The third part extends the problematization of the relationship between the individual work of art and its exposure through the ideas of Walter Benjamin and Maurice Blanchot. The fourth part carries out a close reading of three presentations from the modern era in order to further examine the relationship between the work of art and its presentation, using the tools that have been developed during the study. In the concluding section, it is possible to see clearer borderlines and conditions for the development of an exhibition theory. The concepts that have been analysed and developed into tools are shown to be useful, and the examples take the discussion into a consideration of the altered premises for the encounter with the postmodern work of art.
Resumo:
Modern ryijys, fabric by the yard and handicrafts. Finnish textile art and modernizing applied art during the inter-war years Textile art was in the 1920s and 1930s in the front rank of Finnish applied art and design. Modern ryijys, tapestries and fabrics by the yard by contemporary textile artists were on show in Finland and abroad. Textile art had also become interesting commercially, especially in interior textiles of modern homes. The research uses sources of the Ornamo Association of Decorative Artists, for example the Ornamo year books published from 1927, the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design and the country s only school of applied arts, the Central School of Arts and Crafts and the Museum of Applied Arts maintained by the society and also the national specialist organisation the Friends of Finnish Handicraft. It also refers to the magazines Käsiteollisuus and Kotiliesi. The art historical dissertation studies the renaissance of weaving art of the inter-war years in Finland. It problematizes the relation of the succesfull and appreciated textile art to the concept of breakthrough of Modernism (Functionalism). With the material from textile artists activities it questions the prevailing idea of slow modernization of Finnish applied art and design and challenges the polarization of craft and industry in the discourses of Modernisms of design. The public discussions about modernization of design and applied art where textile art and especially the ryijy got sometimes into difficult positions are interpreted as power struggles. After taking independence in 1917 the Finnish tradition of ryijy rugs was set as a symbol of the original culture of the young nation. The research studies the development of the so called art ryijy and the notions and meanings of hand weaving in the national context and also in relation to contemporary events in international applied art and design. It highlights the continuity of hand crafted production of textiles and the strong position of textile artists working in this field. The research opens new perspectives to Finnish textile artists by showing their activities as entrepreneurs in their own weaving studios or design studios and referring to their many relations and functions as pattern designers and educators in the growing handicraft industries.
Resumo:
This study examined the nature and lifetime prevalence of two types of victimization among Finnish university students: stalking and violence victimization (i.e. general violence). This study was a cross-sectional study using two different datasets of Finnish university students. The stalking data was collected via an electronic questionnaire and the violence victimization data was collected via a postal questionnaire. There were 615 participants in the stalking study (I-III) and 905 participants in the violence victimization study. The thesis consists of four studies. The aims regarding the stalking substudies (Studies I-III) were to examine the lifetime prevalence of stalking among university students and to analyze how stalking is related to victim and stalker characteristics and certain central variables of stalking (victim-stalker relationship, stalking episodes, stalking duration). Specifically, the aim was to identify factors that are associated with stalking violence and to factors contributing to the stalking duration. Furthermore, the aim was also to investigate how university students cope with stalking and whether coping is related to victim and stalker background characteristics and to certain other core variables (victim-stalker relationship, stalking episodes, stalking duration, prior victimization, and stalking violence). The aims for the violence victimization substudy (Study IV) were to examine the prevalence of violence victimization, i.e. general violence (minor and serious physical violence and threats) and how violence victimization is associated with victim/abuser characteristics, symptomology, and the use of student health care services. The present study shows that both stalking and violence victimization (i.e. general violence) are markedly prevalent among Finnish university students. The lifetime prevalence rate for stalking was 48.5% and 46.5% for violence victimization. When the lifetime prevalence rate was restricted to violent stalking and physical violence only, the prevalence decreased to 22% and 42% respectively. The students reported exposure to multiple forms of stalking and violence victimization, demonstrating the diversity of victimization among university students. Stalking victimization was found to be more prevalent among female students, while violence victimization was found to be more prevalent among male students. Most of the victims of stalking knew their stalkers, while the offender in general violence was typically a stranger. Stalking victimization often included violence and continued for a lengthy period. The victim-stalking relationship and stalking behaviors were found to be associated with stalking violence and stalking duration. Based on three identified stalking dimensions (violence, surveillance, contact seeking), the present study found five distinct victim subgroups (classes). Along with the victim-stalker relationship, the victim subgroups emerged as important factors contributing to the stalking duration. Victims of violent stalking did not differ greatly from victims of non-violent stalking in their use of behavioral coping tactics, while exposure to violent stalking had an effect on the use of coping strategies. The victim-offender relationship was also associated to a set of symptoms regarding violence victimization. Furthermore, violence victimization had a significant main effect on specific symptoms (mental health symptoms, alcohol consumption, symptom index), while gender had a significant main effect on most symptoms, yet no interaction effect was found. The present results also show that victims of violence are overrepresented among frequent health care users. The present findings add to the literature on the prevalence and nature of stalking and violence victimization among Finnish university students. Moreover, the present findings stress the importance of violence prevention and intervention in student health care, and may be used as a guideline for policy makers, as well as health care and law enforcement professionals dealing with youth violence prevention.
Resumo:
TRANSFORMATIONS OF NATURE Science, Knowledge and Freedom in the Early Thinking of Rudolf Steiner. Perspectives on Waldorf Education in the light of the History of Ideas Waldorf Education is based on the worldview that Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925) developed to a wide-ranging anthroposophical movement in the first decades of the 20th century. This thesis takes as its departure the early thinking of Rudolf Steiner that precedes anthroposophy, and its main purpose is to uncover the tradition of ideas represented in Steiner´s early life and which, in different ways, have emerged in the practice of Waldorf Education. Through systematic analysis I attempt to bring to light different aspects of Steiner’s early thinking: his concept of science, his epistemological startingpoints and his philosophy of freedom. By departing from J. W. Goethe’s qualitative concept of science, Steiner strove in his early works to formulate a monistic worldview which appears to be closely related to the Romantic Movement and its philosophy of nature. Characteristic traits of his thinking are, on the one hand, a critique of a one-sided enlightenment and, on the other hand, an aspiration to see the world as a living organic unity. Human beings can, by developing our intuitive faculties, get a deeper understanding of the indissoluble relationship between man and nature. Against this background Steiner´s early thinking can be read as a special kind of romantic development narrative. Steiner’s early thinking also opens the way for romantic perspectives on Waldorf Education. It appears that many central aims and conceptions in Waldorf Education can be illuminated by the epistemological perspective upon which Steiner elaborated early in his life. An organic curriculum, phenomenological didactics and high ideal of freedom can be considered seen as educational applications of conceptions that played an important role in Goethe and his age. Thus, Waldorf Education provides in our contemporary society an exceptional set of educational values: a holistic education with romantic undertones.
Resumo:
Cognitive impairments of attention, memory and executive functions are a fundamental feature of the pathophysiology of schizophrenia. The neurophysiological and neurochemical changes in the auditory cortex are shown to underlie cognitive impairmentsin schizophrenia patients. Functional state of the neural substrate of auditory information processing could be objectively and non-invasively probed with auditory event-related potentials (ERPs) and event- related fields (ERFs). In the current work, we explored the neurochemical effect on the neural origins of auditory information processing in relation to schizophrenia. By means of ERPs/ERFs we aimed to determine how neural substrates of auditory information processing are modulated by antipsychotic medication in schizophrenia spectrum patients (Studies I, II) and by neuropharmacological challenges in healthy human subjects (Studies III, IV). First, with auditory ERPs we investigated the effects of olanzapine (Study I) and risperidone (Study II) in a group of patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. After 2 and 4 weeks of treatment, olanzapine has no significant effects on mismatch negativity(MMN) and P300, which, as it has been suggested, respectively reflect preattentive and attention-dependent information processing. After 2 weeks of treatment, risperidone has no significant effect on P300, however risperidone reduces P200 amplitude. This latter effect of risperidone on neural resources responsible for P200 generation could be partly explained through the action of dopamine. Subsequently, we used simultaneous EEG/MEG to investigate the effects of memantine (Study III) and methylphenidate (Study IV) in healthy subjects. We found that memantine modulates MMN response without changing other ERP components. This could be interpreted as being due to the possible influence of memantine through the NMDA receptors on auditory change- detection mechanism, with processing of auditory stimuli remaining otherwise unchanged. Further, we found that methylphenidate does not modulate the MMN response. This finding could indicate no association between catecholaminergic activities and electrophysiological measures of preattentive auditory discrimination processes reflected in the MMN. However, methylphenidate decreases the P200 amplitudes. This could be interpreted as a modulation of auditory information processing reflected in P200 by dopaminergic and noradrenergic systems. Taken together, our set of studies indicates a complex pattern of neurochemical influences produced by the antipsychotic drugs in the neural substrate of auditory information processing in patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders and by the pharmacological challenges in healthy subjects studied with ERPs and ERFs.
Resumo:
The purpose of the research was to study how Finnish lower-stage schools participating in the international network of UNESCO schools, also called the Associated Schools Project (ASP), prepare their students for the future at the level of their school-based curriculums. In the research, the future trends were discussed, and the importance of their consideration in educational practice was explained from a global viewpoint: Based on the examination of today's problematic world state, and development trends characterized by globalization, the challenges and demands set for schooling and education in the future were discussed. Understanding the significance of an individual's action and responsibility was considered to be the central resource for building a more just and sustainable future. The study was grounded on a theoretical model developed by the researcher, which combined the models of Dalin & Rust (1996) and UNESCO (Delors et al. 1996) about future-oriented learning. The model consists of four basic elements of curriculum; "Nature", "Culture", "Myself", and "Others", and four dimension of learning; "Learning to know", "Learning to do", "Learning to live together" and "Learning to be". The model represents the holistic aspect of educational theory, and its aim is to maintain a balance between its different components. The research material composed of ten lower-stage UNESCO schools' school-based curriculums. They were analyzed using the theoretical model by the methology of content analysis. The research results were notably consistent between the different schools. They showed cultural learning and learning concerned with "myself" to be clearly more emphasized than learning referring to nature and other people. In addition, they reflected the central position of subjects, knowledge and skills, thus leaving the development of the pupils' personalities, and particularly learning concerned with living with other people, in a marginal role. The question about whether the schools prepare for the future interms of their curriculums, was discussed in the light of the results. The research offered a way and a model to approach the relationship between education and the future, and to evaluate schools' future-orientation. Based on the results, the schools are suggested to lay more stress on learning concerned with nature and other people, and focus more on developing the mental capasities of their pupils and competencies they need for living with other people. Above all, what the present societies require of schools is education which produces balanced and broadly aware human beings who have the mental strength to face the challenges of the future and abilities to direct it along the lines they desire. Keywords: future, curriculum, content analysis
Resumo:
This study highlights the formation of an artifact designed to mediate exploratory collaboration. The data for this study was collected during a Finnish adaptation of the thinking together approach. The aim of the approach is to teach pulps how to engage in educationally beneficial form of joint discussion, namely exploratory talk. At the heart of the approach lies a set of conversational ground rules aimed to promote the use of exploratory talk. The theoretical framework of the study is based on a sociocultural perspective on learning. A central argument in the framework is that physical and psychological tools play a crucial role in human action and learning. With the help of tools humans can escape the direct stimulus of the outside world and learn to control ourselves by using tools. During the implementation of the approach, the classroom community negotiates a set of six rules, which this study conceptualizes as an artifact that mediates exploratory collaboration. Prior research done about the thinking together approach has not extensively researched the formation of the rules, which give ample reason to conduct this study. The specific research questions asked were: What kind of negotiation trajectories did the ground rules form during the intervention? What meanings were negotiated for the ground rules during the intervention The methodological framework of the study is based on discourse analysis, which has been specified by adapting the social construction of intertextuality to analyze the meanings negotiated for the created rules. The study has town units of analysis: thematic episode and negotiation trajectory. A thematic episode is a stretch of talk-in-interaction where the participants talk about a certain ground rule or a theme relating to it. A negotiation trajectory is a chronological representation of the negotiation process of a certain ground rule during the intervention and is constructed of thematic episodes. Thematic episodes were analyzed with the adapted intertextuality analysis. A contrastive analysis was done on the trajectories. Lastly, the meanings negotiated for the created rules were compared to the guidelines provided by the approach. The main result of the study is the observation, that the meanings of the created rules were more aligned with the ground rules of cumulative talk, rather than exploratory talk. Although meanings relating also to exploratory talk were negotiated, they clearly were not the dominant form. In addition, the study observed that the trajectories of the rules were non identical. Despite connecting dimensions (symmetry, composition, continuity and explicitness) none of the trajectories shared exactly the same features as the others.
Resumo:
The aim of the study was to get acquainted with the activity of Näppärät Mummot, a Lahti-based crafts society, and its importance to the wellness of the members of the group. The selected aim, i.e., analyzing the wellness, largely affected the whole research process and its results. According to earlier studies in the field, different forms of craft and expressional activity promote one's wellness as well as support the work for one's identity. Based on my theoretical knowledge, my research was set out to: 1) form a general view of crafts culture within Näppärät Mummot and 2) find out how recollective craft that promotes wellness is perceived through communality, experiential activity, work for one's identity, and divided as well as undivided craft. Qualitative field work was governed by ethnographic research strategy, according to which I set out to get thoroughly familiar with the society I was studying. The methods I used to collect data were participant observation and thematic interview. I used a field diary for writing down all data I acquired through the observation. The interviewee group was formed by seven members of Näppärät Mummot. An mp3 recorder was used to record the interviews, which I transcribed later. The method for data analysis was qualitative content analysis, for which I used Weft QDA, a qualitative analysis software application. I formed themes that shed light on research tasks from the data using coding and theory-driven analysis. I kept literature and data I collected in cooperation through the whole analysis process. Lastly, drawing from the classes of meaning of therapeutic craft that I sketched by means of summarizing and classifying, I presented the central concepts that describe the main results of the study. The main results were six concepts that describe Näppärät Mummot's crafts culture and recollective craft with its wellness-beneficial effect: 1) autobiographical craft, 2) shared work for one's identity, 3) shared intention for craft, 4) craft as a partner, 5) individual manner of craft, and 6) shared improvement. Craft promoted wellness in many ways. It was used to promote inner life management in difficult times and it also provided sensations of empowerment through pleasure from craft. Expressional, shared craft also served as means of reinforcing one's identity in various ways. Expressional work for one's identity through autobiographical themes of craft represented rearranging one's life through holistic craft. A personal way of doing things also served as expressional action and work for one's identity even with divided craft. Shared work for identities meant reinforcing the identities of the members through discources of craft and interaction with their close ones. What proves the interconnection between communality and craft as well as their shared meaning is that communality motivated the members to work on their craft projects, while craft served as the means of communication between the members: communication through craft was easier than lingual communication. The results can not be generalized to apply to other groups: they are used to describe the versatile means of recollective craft to promote the well-being among the crafts society Näppärät Mummot. However, the results do introduce a new perspective to the social discussion on how cultural activities promote well-being.
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Matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) -8, collagenase-2, is a key mediator of irreversible tissue destruction in chronic periodontitis and detectable in gingival crevicular fluid (GCF). MMP-8 mostly originates from neutrophil leukocytes, the first line of defence cells which exist abundantly in GCF, especially in inflammation. MMP-8 is capable of degrading almost all extra-cellular matrix and basement membrane components and is especially efficient against type I collagen. Thus the expression of MMP-8 in GCF could be valuable in monitoring the activity of periodontitis and possibly offers a diagnostic means to predict progression of periodontitis. In this study the value of MMP-8 detection from GCF in monitoring of periodontal health and disease was evaluated with special reference to its ability to differentiate periodontal health and different disease states of the periodontium and to recognise the progression of periodontitis, i.e. active sites. For chair-side detection of MMP-8 from the GCF or peri-implant sulcus fluid (PISF) samples, a dip-stick test based on immunochromatography involving two monoclonal antibodies was developed. The immunoassay for the detection of MMP-8 from GCF was found to be more suitable for monitoring of periodontitis than detection of GCF elastase concentration or activity. Periodontally healthy subjects and individuals suffering of gingivitis or of periodontitis could be differentiated by means of GCF MMP-8 levels and dipstick testing when the positive threshold value of the MMP-8 chair-side test was set at 1000 µg/l. MMP-8 dipstick test results from periodontally healthy and from subjects with gingivitis were mainly negative while periodontitis patients sites with deep pockets ( 5 mm) and which were bleeding on probing were most often test positive. Periodontitis patients GCF MMP-8 levels decreased with hygiene phase periodontal treatment (scaling and root planing, SRP) and even reduced during the three month maintenance phase. A decrease in GCF MMP-8 levels could be monitored with the MMP-8 test. Agreement between the test stick and the quantitative assay was very good (κ = 0.81) and the test provided a baseline sensitivity of 0.83 and specificity of 0.96. During the 12-month longitudinal maintenance phase, periodontitis patients progressing sites (sites with an increase in attachment loss ≥ 2 mm during the maintenance phase) had elevated GCF MMP-8 levels compared with stable sites. General mean MMP-8 concentrations in smokers (S) sites were lower than in non-smokers (NS) sites but in progressing S and NS sites concentrations were at an equal level. Sites with exceptionally and repeatedly elevated MMP-8 concentrations during the maintenance phase were clustered in smoking patients with poor response to SRP (refractory patients). These sites especially were identified by the MMP-8 test. Subgingival plaque samples from periodontitis patients deep periodontal pockets were examined by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to find out if periodontal lesions may serve as a niche for Chlamydia pneumoniae. Findings were compared with the clinical periodontal parameters and GCF MMP-8 levels to determine the correlation with periodontal status. Traces of C. pneumoniae were identified from one periodontitis patient s pooled subgingival plaque sample by means of PCR. After periodontal treatment (SRP) the sample was negative for C. pneumoniae. Clinical parameters or biomarkers (MMP-8) of the patient with the positive C. pneumoniae finding did not differ from other study patients. In this study it was concluded that MMP-8 concentrations in GCF of sites from periodontally healthy individuals, subjects with gingivitis or with periodontitis are at different levels. The cut-off value of the developed MMP-8 test is at an optimal level to differentiate between these conditions and can possibly be utilised in identification of individuals at the risk of the transition of gingivitis to periodontitis. In periodontitis patients, repeatedly elevated GCF MMP-8 concentrations may indicate sites at risk of progression of periodontitis as well as patients with poor response to conventional periodontal treatment (SRP). This can be monitored by MMP-8 testing. Despite the lower mean GCF MMP-8 concentrations in smokers, a fraction of smokers sites expressed very high MMP-8 concentrations together with enhanced periodontal activity and could be identified with MMP-8 specific chair-side test. Deep periodontal lesions may be niches for non-periodontopathogenic micro-organisms with systemic effects like C. pneumoniae and possibly play a role in the transmission from one subject to another.