Environments of Acitive Galaxies

This dissertation presents studies on the environments of active galaxies. Paper I is a case study of a cluster of galaxies containing BL Lac object RGB 1745+398. We measured the velocity dispersion, mass, and richness of the cluster. This was one of the most thorough studies of the environments of a BL Lac object. Methods used in the paper could be used in the future for studying other clusters as well. In Paper II we studied the environments of nearby quasars in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). We found that quasars have less neighboring galaxies than luminous inactive galaxies. In the large-scale structure, quasars are usually located at the edges of superclusters or even in void regions. We concluded that these low-redshift quasars may have become active only recently because the galaxies in low-density environments evolve later to the phase where quasar activity can be triggered. In Paper III we extended the analysis of Paper II to other types of AGN besides quasars. We found that different types of AGN have different large-scale environments. Radio galaxies are more concentrated in superclusters, while quasars and Seyfert galaxies prefer low-density environments. Different environments indicate that AGN have different roles in galaxy evolution. Our results suggest that activity of galaxies may depend on their environment on the large scale. Our results in Paper III raised questions of the cause of the environment-dependency in the evolution of galaxies. Because high-density large-scale environments contain richer groups and clusters than the underdense environments, our results could reflect smaller-scale effects. In Paper IV we addressed this problem by studying the group and supercluster scale environments of galaxies together. We compared the galaxy populations in groups of different richnesses in different large-scale environments. We found that the large-scale environment affects the galaxies independently of the group richness. Galaxies in low-density environments on the large scale are more likely to be star-forming than those in superclusters even if they are in groups with the same richness. Based on these studies, the conclusion of this dissertation is that the large-scale environment affects the evolution of galaxies. This may be caused by different “speed” of galaxy evolution in low and high-density environments: galaxies in dense environments reach certain phases of evolution earlier than galaxies in underdense environments. As a result, the low-density regions at low redshifts are populated by galaxies in earlier phases of evolution than galaxies in high-density regions.

Individual dietary counselling during and after pregnancy: Impact on diet and body weight

In Finland, maternity and child health clinics play a key role in promoting health in young families. Currently, obesity causes the greatest challenges to clinics. In obese pregnant women, an increased risk for metabolic diseases exist which can affect both the mother and child. The purpose of this thesis was to explore the role of dietary counselling: in Finnish health clinics; in the regulation of dietary intake; and in affecting the body weight of women. The main aim was to test the effect of dietary counselling and probiotic intervention on dietary intake and maternal body weight during and after pregnancy. In addition to dietary counselling, the effect of other factors, such as eating behaviour on dietary intake and body weight control after pregnancy was assessed. Another aim was also to evaluate dietary counselling practices by nurses (n = 327) in Finnish health clinics assessed by a questionnaire. At the beginning of the pregnancy, women (n = 256) enrolled in a dietary intervention study, were randomised into three groups. One group received dietary counselling with probiotics, one had counselling with placebo and the third group was the control group. The control group consisted of women whom did not receive counselling and took placebo. Probiotics and placebo supplements were used until the end of exclusive breastfeeding or six months after pregnancy. Women were followed from early pregnancy up to four years after pregnancy. Follow-up visits took place three times during pregnancy, at one and six months, and one, two and four years after pregnancy. Dietary counselling, provided by a nutritionist, aimed to influence the quality of dietary fat intake. Dietary counselling is important to provide in clinics, as determined by the nurses, and these nurses expressed a want to improve their own nutritional knowledge through education. The nurses had varying knowledge of current dietary recommendations. Dietary counselling for women during and after pregnancy resulted in beneficial changes in dietary intake up to one year after pregnancy and body weight and waist circumference up to four years after pregnancy. Probiotics had a beneficial effect together with dietary counselling on waist circumference until one year after pregnancy, but not throughout the long term, four years after pregnancy. Other factors, such as eating behaviour, associated with dietary intake and body weight control after pregnancy. Specifically, dietary recommendations are reached amongst women whom had high cognitive restraint in their eating behaviour and did not demonstrate uncontrolled eating. Overweight women more frequently emotionally ate compared to normal weight women and women with central adiposity related more frequently to having an uncontrolled eating behaviour than women with normal waist circumference. In addition, being overweight prior to pregnancy and excessive weight gain during pregnancy associated with increased body weight retention after pregnancy. This study showed that individual dietary counselling is useful in influencing dietary intake which adheres to dietary recommendations and this counselling influences, favourably, body weight after pregnancy. Especially, women with the risk for weight retention, such as women who have emotional and uncontrolled eating behaviours, who were overweight prior to pregnancy or those who had excessive weight gain during pregnancy, may benefit from individual dietary counselling. This study underscores the need to develop dietary counselling practices for pregnant women and their follow-up after pregnancy in Finnish health clinics. These practices include increasing the efficacy of the counselling such as collaboration with families, having knowledgable health professionals and having sufficient resources.

Drivers and barriers of mobile travel and tourism service adoption : a study of individual perceptions and business model development in a travel and tourism context

The Travel and Tourism field is undergoing changes due to the rapid development of information technology and digital services. Online travel has profoundly changed the way travel and tourism organizations interact with their customers. Mobile technology such as mobile services for pocket devices (e.g. mobile phones) has the potential to take this development even further. Nevertheless, many issues have been highlighted since the early days of mobile services development (e.g. the lack of relevance, ease of use of many services). However, the wide adoption of smartphones and the mobile Internet in many countries as well as the formation of so-called ecosystems between vendors of mobile technology indicate that many of these issues have been overcome. Also when looking at the numbers of downloaded applications related to travel in application stores like Google Play, it seems obvious that mobile travel and tourism services are adopted and used by many individuals. However, as business is expected to start booming in the mobile era, many issues have a tendency to be overlooked. Travelers are generally on the go and thus services that work effectively in mobile settings (e.g. during a trip) are essential. Hence, the individuals’ perceived drivers and barriers to use mobile travel and tourism services in on-site or during trip settings seem particularly valuable to understand; thus this is one primary aim of the thesis. We are, however, also interested in understanding different types of mobile travel service users. Individuals may indeed be very different in their propensity to adopt and use technology based innovations (services). Research is also switching more from investigating issues of mobile service development to understanding individuals’ usage patterns of mobile services. But designing new mobile services may be a complex matter from a service provider perspective. Hence, our secondary aim is to provide insights into drivers and barriers of mobile travel and tourism service development from a holistic business model perspective. To accomplish the research objectives seven different studies have been conducted over a time period from 2002 – 2013. The studies are founded on and contribute to theories within diffusion of innovations, technology acceptance, value creation, user experience and business model development. Several different research methods are utilized: surveys, field and laboratory experiments and action research. The findings suggest that a successful mobile travel and tourism service is a service which supports one or several mobile motives (needs) of individuals such as spontaneous needs, time-critical arrangements, efficiency ambitions, mobility related needs (location features) and entertainment needs. The service could be customized to support travelers’ style of traveling (e.g. organized travel or independent travel) and should be easy to use, especially easy to take into use (access, install and learn) during a trip, without causing security concerns and/or financial risks for the user. In fact, the findings suggest that the most prominent barrier to the use of mobile travel and tourism services during a trip is an individual’s perceived financial cost (entry costs and usage costs). It should, however, be noted that regulations are put in place in the EU regarding data roaming prices between European countries and national telecom operators are starting to see ‘international data subscriptions’ as a sales advantage (e.g. Finnish Sonera provides a data subscription in the Baltic and Nordic region at the same price as in Finland), which will enhance the adoption of mobile travel and tourism services also in international contexts. In order to speed up the adoption rate travel service providers could consider e.g. more local initiatives of free Wi-Fi networks, development of services that can be used, at least to some extent, in an offline mode (do not require costly network access during a trip) and cooperation with telecom operators (e.g. lower usage costs for travelers who use specific mobile services or travel with specific vendors). Furthermore, based on a developed framework for user experience of mobile trip arrangements, the results show that a well-designed mobile site and/or native application, which preferably supports integration with other mobile services, is a must for true mobile presence. In fact, travel service providers who want to build a relationship with their customers need to consider a downloadable native application, but in order to be found through the mobile channel and make contact with potential new customers, a mobile website should be available. Moreover, we have made a first attempt with cluster analysis to identify user categories of mobile services in a travel and tourism context. The following four categories were identified: info-seekers, checkers, bookers and all-rounders. For example “all-rounders”, represented primarily by individuals who use their pocket device for almost any of the investigated mobile travel services, constituted primarily of 23 to 50 year old males with high travel frequency and great online experience. The results also indicate that travel service providers will increasingly become multi-channel providers. To manage multiple online channels, closely integrated and hybrid online platforms for different devices, supporting all steps in a traveler process should be considered. It could be useful for travel service providers to focus more on developing browser-based mobile services (HTML5-solutions) than native applications that work only with specific operating systems and for specific devices. Based on an action research study and utilizing a holistic business model framework called STOF we found that HTML5 as an emerging platform, at least for now, has some limitations regarding the development of the user experience and monetizing the application. In fact, a native application store (e.g. Google Play) may be a key mediator in the adoption of mobile travel and tourism services both from a traveler and a service provider perspective. Moreover, it must be remembered that many device and mobile operating system developers want service providers to specifically create services for their platforms and see native applications as a strategic advantage to sell more devices of a certain kind. The mobile telecom industry has moved into a battle of ecosystems where device makers, developers of operating systems and service developers are to some extent forced to choose their development platforms.

Searchig the links between "knowledge governance mechanisms", "the individual conditions of knowledge sharing", and "individual's knowledge sharing behaviour".

The objective of this study was to understand how organizational knowledge governance mechanisms affect individual motivation, opportunity, and the ability to share knowledge (MOA framework), and further, how individual knowledge-sharing conditions affect actual knowledge sharing behaviour. The study followed the knowledge governance approach and a micro-foundations perspective to develop a theoretical model and hypotheses, which could explain the casual relationships between knowledge governance mechanisms, individual knowledge sharing conditions, and individual knowledge sharing behaviour. The quantitative research strategy and multivariate data analysis techniques (SEM) were used in the hypotheses testing with a survey dataset of 256 employees from eleven military schools of Finnish Defence Forces (FDF). The results showed that “performance-based feedback and rewards” affects employee’s “intrinsic motivation towards knowledge sharing”, that “lateral coordination” affects employee’s “knowledge self-efficacy”, and that ”training and development” is positively related to “time availability” for knowledge sharing but affects negatively employee’s knowledge self-efficacy. Individual motivation and knowledge self-efficacy towards knowledge sharing affected knowledge sharing behaviour when work-related knowledge was shared 1) between employees in a department and 2) between employees in different departments, however these factors did not play a crucial role in subordinate–superior knowledge sharing. The findings suggest that individual motivation, opportunity, and the ability towards knowledge sharing affects individual knowledge sharing behaviour differently in different knowledge sharing situations. Furthermore, knowledge governance mechanisms can be used to manage individual-level knowledge sharing conditions and individual knowledge sharing behaviour but their affect also vary in different knowledge sharing situations.

Incest aversion : the evolutionary roots of individual regulation

Den evolutionära förklaringen till den allmänt utbredda incestaversionen, dvs. motviljan för sex med nära släktingar, försöker besvara såväl frågan om varför incestaversionen gynnats i det naturliga urvalet som frågan om hur denna aversion regleras på individuell nivå. Eftersom inavlade barn har en försämrad biologisk duglighet än andra barn, medför kostnaderna av denna icke-optimala reproduktion ett selektionstryck mot inavel. I en serie studier visade vi att eftersom kvinnor i allmänhet satsar mer biologiska resurser på sina barn än vad män gör, känner kvinnor starkare incestaversion än män och eftersom det endast är fertila kvinnor som riskerar satsa resurser i en inavlad avkomma har även fertila kvinnor högre incestaversion än icke-fertila kvinnor. Vi visade också att de biologiska kostnaderna av inavel inte begränsas till enbart de individer som har incest. Eftersom alla våra biologiska släktingar sannolikt delar våra alleler speglar incestaversionen även de biologiska kostnader som incest mellan våra släktingar medför åt oss. Den psykologiska mekanism med vilken incestsituationer bedöms har hittills varit okänd. I våra studier testades teorin om självreflekterande empati. Enligt den teorin bedöms sådana situationer emotionellt genom att man själv föreställer sig ha sex med motsvarande släkting och känslan som väcks i denna process ger därefter emotionell information till bedömningen av andras incest. I tre delstudier fann vi att självreflektion var positivt associerat med styrkan av aversion gentemot andras incest, vilket stöder teorin om självreflekterande empati.

Culture in business interaction: an individual perspective : empirical studies in Finnish-Russian business relationships

The main objective of this doctoral dissertation is to reach a holistic and indepth understanding of the intercultural interaction within dyadic business relationships through the perspective of individual managers. The empirical setting is dyadic business relationships between Russian and Finnish firms in construction and engineering industries. The motivation for the study mainly arose from: 1) the lack of business marketing literature considering cultural and individual perspectives; 2) the need to find ways to study intercultural issues in business relationships, other than through the application of models derived from the work of Hofstede (1980). The study consists of two parts, an introductory essay containing the research objectives, theoretical foundations, methodological choices, limitations and contributions, and original research articles. The four articles each address a sub-objective: 1) to develop an understanding of intercultural business relationships development, cultural adaptation, and its role in the development of trust (Article 1); 2) to develop an appropriate methodological framework for studying business interaction from a cultural and individual perspective (Article 2); 3) to develop an understanding of the role of culture in individual manager’s sensemaking of interaction events in business relationships (Article 3); and 4) to develop an appropriate theoretical framework for studying interactive intercultural business relationships in international industrial markets (Article 4). The ontological and epistemological foundations are built on the interpretivist/ social constructivist view of reality. Interaction, in this study, is seen as being conducted between individuals, who are the key representative actors of their firms. In turn, culture is regarded both as an independent context existing prior to the individuals’ participation in it, and as knowledge incorporated by the individuals, who use it in sensemaking and interaction across cultures. The methods applied in the articles are: an interpretive qualitative study (Article 1), a literature review and conceptual analysis (Article 2), a structural analysis of the narratives and a metaphor analysis (Article 3), and a literature review and conceptual analysis (Article 4). The main contributions are the following. First, it contributes to business marketing literature by developing the theoretical, conceptual, and methodological underpinning of IMP theories in relation to culture. Second, the thesis contributes to the growing literature on managerial sensemaking in industrial markets by looking at it from a cultural perspective, as well as emphasizing the importance of figurative language in cultural sensemaking.

Parâmetros da habilidade competitiva no estabelecimento de populações caracterizam o potencial de produção individual em trigo e aveia

Em monoculturas, normalmente se observa uma variação de produção entre plantas, que pode estar ocorrendo desde o estabelecimento da população, pela habilidade competitiva destas. Este trabalho foi desenvolvido com o objetivo de selecionar parâmetros de habilidade competitiva, durante o estabelecimento, que se relacionam com o potencial de produção, no final do desenvolvimento. Plantas de trigo (EMBRAPA 16) e aveia (UFRGS 15) foram cultivadas em canteiros e a campo, correlacionando-se parâmetros morfológicos, nos estádios de afilhamento e florescimento. No afilhamento, nossos resultados revelaram que o diâmetro do pseudocolmo e o desenvolvimento foliar foram os parâmetros mais relevantes na caracterização da habilidade competitiva, pela alta associação com a massa seca, independente da espécie e do ambiente. Nestas populações, a ordem com que as plantas emergiram foi inversamente relacionada com o estádio de desenvolvimento apical (para inflorescência) e com os parâmetros que definiram a habilidade competitiva. Esta habilidade de competição inicial foi diretamente relacionada com o tamanho e a potencialidade de produção (espiguetas por inflorescência) das plantas, no estádio de florescimento. Os resultados indicam que o potencial de produção individual pode ser estimado por medidas de parâmetros não destrutivos, da capacidade de competição, nos primeiros estádios de desenvolvimento das plantas.

Individual learner, peer group and teacher roles in fostering autonomous language-learning behaviour

Julkaisumaa: Bulgaria

Dynamical and Chemical Structure of Galactic Halos

This doctoral dissertation presents studies of the formation and evolution of galaxies, through observations and simulations of galactic halos. The halo is the component of galaxies which hosts some of the oldest objects we know of in the cosmos; it is where clues to the history of galaxies are found, for example, by how the chemical structure is related to the dynamics of objects in the halo. The dynamical and chemical structure of halos, both in the Milky Way’s own halo, and in two elliptical galaxies, is the underlying theme in the research. I focus on the density falloff and chemistry of the two external halos, and on the dynamics, density falloff, and chemistry of the Milky Way halo. I first study galactic halos via computer simulations, to test the long- term stability of an anomalous feature recently found in kinematics of the Milky Way’s metal-poor stellar halo. I find that the feature is transient, making its origin unclear. I use a second set of simulations to test if an initially strong relation between the dynamics and chemistry of halo glob-ular clusters in a Milky Way-type galaxy is affected by a merging satellite galaxy, and find that the relation remains strong despite a merger in which the satellite is a third of the mass of the host galaxy. From simulations, I move to observing halos in nearby galaxies, a challenging procedure as most of the light from galaxies comes from the disk and bulge components as opposed to the halo. I use Hubble Space Tele scope observations of the halo of the galaxy M87 and, comparing to similar observations of NGC 5128, find that the chemical structure of the inner halo is similar for both of these giant elliptical galaxies. I use Very Large Telescope observations of the outer halo of NGC 5128 (Centaurus A) and, because of the difficultly in resolving dim extragalac- tic stellar halo populations, I introduce a new technique to subtract the contaminating background galaxies. A transition from a metal-rich stellar halo to a metal-poor has previously been discovered in two different types of galaxies, the disk galaxy M31 and the classic elliptical NGC 3379. Unexpectedly, I discover in this third type of galaxy, the merger remnant NGC 5128, that the density of metal-rich and metal-poor halo stars falls at the same rate within the galactocentric radii of 8 − 65 kpc, the limit of our observations. This thesis presents new results which open opportunities for future investigations.