During pregnancy, the basal activity is increased in both of our major stress response systems: the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis. At the same time, the reactivity towards stressors is reduced. These alterations sustain maternal and fetal homeostasis, and are involved in the regulation of gestational length. Although the feto-placental hormone synthesis produces the main endocrinological changes, also the central nervous system undergoes adaptation. Together, these profound adjustments have been suggested to make women’s mental health more vulnerable during pregnancy and postpartum period. The aim of this thesis was to examine factors connected to physiological stress responses during the late pregnancy in relation to pain, labour onset, emotional reactivity, and mental health. The first study examined the pain and sympathetic response during cold stress, in relation to time to delivery. Women with fewer days to spontaneous delivery had lower sympathetic reactivity, while no pain measure was associated with time to delivery. In the second study, acoustic startle response modulation was employed to study emotional reactivity during late gestation, and at four to six weeks postpartum. The startle response was measured by eye-blink electromyography, while the participants watched pleasant and unpleasant pictures, and positive and negative anticipation stimuli. A significant reduction in startle modulation by anticipation was found during the postpartum assessment. However, no startle modulation by pleasant, or unpleasant, pictures was detected at either time-point. The serum level of allopregnanolone, a neurosteroid implied in pregnancy-induced hyporeactivity, was analysed in relation to self-reported symptoms of anxiety and depression. Although the participants reported low levels of depression, the women with the highest depression scores had significantly lower levels of serum allopregnanolone. There was no correlation between allopregnanolone and anxiety scores. In the fourth study, the cortisol awakening response was compared between women with depression during pregnancy, women with depression prior to pregnancy, and women who had never suffered from depression. No group differences in cortisol awakening response during late pregnancy were found. The results are in line with the previously described pregnancy-induced hyporesponsiveness, and add to the knowledge on maternal stress hyporeactivity, gestational length, and maternal mental health.

Ce mémoire débute avec deux chapitres portant sur les problèmes des conduites et la régulation du stress, notamment sur l’axe hypothalamique-pituitaire-surrénal (HPS). Ensuite, la littérature est résumée et nous voyons que les études qui cherchent à établir un lien entre les problèmes des conduites et l’axe HPS ont trouvé des résultats différents et parfois contradictoires. Le chapitre suivant illustre les problèmes méthodologiques qui pourraient expliquer ces résultats différents. Vient ensuite l’étude présentée dans ce mémoire qui cherche à établir un lien entre la réponse cortisolaire à l’éveil (RCE), considérée comme un bon indice du fonctionnent de l’axe HPS, et les problèmes de conduites chez l’enfant. De plus, les émotions négatives ont été associées avec les problèmes des conduites ainsi qu’aux dysfonctions de l’axe HPS, notamment le RCE. L’étude présentée dans ce mémoire cherche aussi à établir si les émotions négatives pourrait être une variable médiatrice dans la relation potentielle entre la RCE et les problèmes des conduites. L’étude révèle que pour les garçons mais pas pour les filles, une RCE réduite est associée avec les émotions négatives, ce qui est successivement associé avec les problèmes des conduites. Le dernier chapitre du mémoire examine les implications théoriques de cette médiatisation et propose également des pistes psychobiologiques pour expliquer les différences sexuelles observées. / This thesis begins with two chapters which discuss conduct problems and stress regulation, with a focus on the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. Subsequently, the literature is reviewed and we see that with regards to the relationship between conduct problems and HPA axis activity, the findings are inconsistent. It is possible that methodological considerations underlie the inconsistency found in the literature and the following chapter is concerned with methodology. This is followed by the featured study presented in this thesis which examines the link between the cortisol awakening response (CAR), which is considered a good indicator of HPA axis functioning, and conduct problems in children. Further, negative affect has been linked to both conduct problems and the Cortisol Awakening Response (CAR). Thus it was hypothesized that negative affect acts as a mediator in the cortisol-conduct problems relationship. The featured study found that a reduced CAR was associated with both negative affect and conduct problems, however only in boys and not in girls. Further, the mediation hypothesis was supported in boys. The last chapter in this thesis discusses the implications of this mediation finding for theories of conduct problems as well as proposing some psychobiological mechanisms to explain the sex differences found.

O propósito deste trabalho é uma tentativa de leitura a partir de três obras de José Saramago: O Evangelho Segundo Jesus Cristo, A Caverna e o Ensaio Sobre a Lucidez. Buscamos analisar nessas obras algumas estruturas do poder de nossa sociedade e mostrar como esse poder influi e reflete nos homens. Para tanto, é feita uma análise sobre a sociedade atual onde foram desenvolvidos aspectos históricos, sócio-filosóficos, como também as particularidades da escrita saramaguiana que faz uma construção textual coesa, onde os vínculos subjetivos das personagens reforçam a grande mensagem de intervenção de sua obra, que é a busca sem limites pela emancipação humana. / The objective of this essay is to try, based on the follwing works of José Saramago The Gospel Accordind to Jesus Christ, The Cave and Awakening, to analyse the structures of power that exists in our society, such as described in these books, and to show how this power influnces and reflects on mankind. Therefore, a detailed analysis of todays society is made, with the development of historical, social and philosophical aspects, as much as, an analysis on the particularities of José Saramago writing style, where the characterss subjective links enhances the message held within the texte, which is mankinds unlimited search for amancipation.

O propósito deste trabalho é uma tentativa de leitura a partir de três obras de José Saramago: O Evangelho Segundo Jesus Cristo, A Caverna e o Ensaio Sobre a Lucidez. Buscamos analisar nessas obras algumas estruturas do poder de nossa sociedade e mostrar como esse poder influi e reflete nos homens. Para tanto, é feita uma análise sobre a sociedade atual onde foram desenvolvidos aspectos históricos, sócio-filosóficos, como também as particularidades da escrita saramaguiana que faz uma construção textual coesa, onde os vínculos subjetivos das personagens reforçam a grande mensagem de intervenção de sua obra, que é a busca sem limites pela emancipação humana. / The objective of this essay is to try, based on the follwing works of José Saramago The Gospel Accordind to Jesus Christ, The Cave and Awakening, to analyse the structures of power that exists in our society, such as described in these books, and to show how this power influnces and reflects on mankind. Therefore, a detailed analysis of todays society is made, with the development of historical, social and philosophical aspects, as much as, an analysis on the particularities of José Saramago writing style, where the characterss subjective links enhances the message held within the texte, which is mankinds unlimited search for amancipation.

In this essay, Kate Chopin's portraits of women in three short stories, 'The Story of an Hour', 'A Respectable Woman', Athénaïse and the novel The Awakening are studied. It is argued that the outcomes depicted can be seen as increasingly provocative and extreme and that the main conflict and ending of The Awakening is a development and combination of the conflicts and resolutions in the three short stories. / I uppsatsen studeras Kate Chopins kvinnoporträtt i tre noveller, 'The Story of an Hour', 'A Respectable Woman', Athénaïse och i romanen The Awakening. Syftet är att visa att huvudhandlingen och slutet på The Awakening är en utveckling och kombination av de alltmer provokativa och extrema handlingarna och upplösningarna i novellerna.

Abstract The purpose of this study is to increase understanding of participating in strategy practice when examined as membership in organizational hierarchy and as subjectivities in strategy discourse. The study approaches subjectivity in strategy practice from the viewpoint of organizational research within the strategy-as-practice (SasP) field, but has chosen a critical perspective to the assumption that strategy work belongs only to senior management. The study is based on interviews relating experiences of strategy participation in a public sector organization. It was found that when strategic planning and decision-making take place fairly far from practical everyday work, two separate strategy worlds would emerge within the organization: the conceptual and the practical world. The well-intended decisions made in the conceptual strategy world set demands for the subjects in the practical strategy world, who had to resort to coping mechanisms and survival strategies to deal with the practical consequences of the decisions. Furthermore, the traditional view of strategy as a senior management's top-down plan seemed to result in a division between strategy subjects and strategy objects. The division of subjectivities was not this dichotomic, however, as individuals moved more dynamically between the subjectivities identified in the strategy discourse. These positionings and subjectivities were products of the strategy practice and strategy discourse and they were studied using discourse analysis and positioning analysis. This study also opens a discussion on how a strategist's subjectivity could be defined within the strategy practices instead of being determined by hierarchical status. It proposes organizational citizenship as a basis for participating in strategy and views strategy as a combination of performing everyday work in a continuum, awakening and reacting to discontinuities and making necessary changes. / Tiivistelmä Tämän tutkimuksen tavoitteena on lisätä ymmärrystä siitä, millaiseksi strategiatyöhön osallistuminen määrittyy, kun sitä tarkastellaan toisaalta organisaation hierarkian jäsenyytenä ja toisaalta organisaation strategiadiskurssin subjektiviteetteina. Tutkimus kiinnittyy organisaatiotutkimuksen näkökulmasta strategy-as-practice (SasP) -kenttään tarkastellessaan strategiatoimijuutta osallistumisena strategiakäytäntöön, mutta valitsee kuitenkin kriittisen tarkastelukulman siihen, että strategiatyö kuuluisi vain johdolle. Tämä tutkimus perustuu haastatteluihin, joissa kartoitettiin strategiatyöhön osallistumisen kokemuksia kuntaorganisaatiossa. Yksi tutkimuksen havainnoista oli, että strategisen suunnittelun ja päätöksenteon tapahtuessa suhteellisen kaukana työn arjesta organisaatiossa näytti muodostuvan kaksi erilaista strategiamaailmaa: konseptuaalinen ja käytännöllinen. Konseptuaalisen strategiamaailman hyvässä tarkoituksessa tekemät strategiset linjaukset edellyttivät usein käytännöllisen strategiamaailman toimijoilta erilaisia selviytymismekanismeja ja selviytymisstrategioita. Lisäksi strategiatradition näkemys strategiasta johdon suunnitelmana näytti johtavan jakoon strategiasubjekteihin ja strategiaobjekteihin sekä osallistujiin ja osallistettaviin. Subjektiviteettien osalta jako ei kuitenkaan ollut näin dikotominen, vaan yksilöt liikkuivat dynaamisemmin strategiadiskurssissa tunnistettujen subjektiviteettien välillä. Näitä strategiakäytännössä ja strategiadiskurssissa muotoutuvia asemointeja ja subjektiviteetteja tutkittiin diskurssi- ja positiointianalyysia hyödyntämällä. Tutkimuksessa avataan keskustelua myös siitä, kuinka strategistin toimijuus voitaisiin nähdä strategiakäytännöissä määrittyvänä sen sijaan, että se määrittyy hierarkkisen aseman myötä tulevana oletuksena. Tällöin strategiaan osallistumista tarkastellaan organisaatiokansalaisuuteen liittyvänä toimijuutena ja strategia nähdään jatkumosta, epäjatkuvuuskohtiin havahtumisesta ja epäjatkuvuuskohtiin liittyvistä muutoksista muodostuvana kokonaisuutena.

In this study on form within the field of Gender and Fem(me)inist Studies I build on, and work with, works created by black women and femmes, as well as femmes and women of color to explore their ways of theorizing through form, as well as finding my own, with roots from all the beautiful experiments lived and written about by these folks. As I sketch out these theories and texts and bring them to the Swedish context in which I write I am breaking new ground for research on blackness, femme-inist theory and form as well as methodologies here. Using an approach of mixed methodologies – formulated in the concepts of femmebodimotive writing and other pleasurable methodologies – I use my body and its emotions oozing from it as a tool for theorizing in the intersections of gender, sexuality, blackness, care and its connections to water, kinship, language, pleasure and rest. I tend to various intersections of these to find new ways of swAfrican (Swedish and African Tanzanian) Black, femme, borderland(s) being in the world. The first chapter sketches out these borderlands as they connect in my body and its surroundings. It is highly inspired by Alexis Pauline Gumbs’ Spill in its form and will invite you to think care with me as I wrap my hair in queer kangas (colorfully sketched out in a KangaProject) over which we wander to the Kiswahili coast and take a plunge in black waters. This is where the second chapter starts, in the biomythographical waters, waves and currents carried inside us, and by us, as well as the waters and currents connecting the worlds corners. All water carries the currents of histories of genders, sexualities, kinship and languages and this, as well as the un/realness of the black bodies in focus, is intimately explored with the help of Omise’ekeNatasha Tinsley, Christina Sharpe, Sara Ahmed, a few other theorists, dictionaries and me. And as the waters runs up and down, from side to side, the waves and wakes travel further in time. These waves travel all the way into sleep, and into the third chapter. Upon entering this final chapter, you find a small visual constellation of these sleep waves. Here, rest and pleasure are in focus and I think with and through Navild Acosta and Fannie Sosa’s installation of Black Power Naps as a way to think blackness and femme-inity and their movements as theory, joy and as connected to pleasurable methodologies. My explorations lead me to the importance of form and texture for knowledge production as it may show other dimensions of theoretical thoughts and problems. In highlighting this I also show how the master (thesis) form may be approached differently by Black femmes of color and thus illuminating what issues these bodies have in white academic spaces.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.